Public Opinion

Pakistan’s Dangerous Turn

Communications — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 00:15:00 -0400

A New America Event
06/20/2008 - 12:15pm

On June 20th the New America Foundation’s American Strategy Program hosted the release of Terror Free Tomorrow’s groundbreaking new surveys of Pakistani public opinion, presented by Terror Free Tomorrow’s President Ken Ballen. New America scholars Peter Bergen and Nicholas Schmidle then provided expert analysis of the data and the detailed the implications of the report for future American policy toward Pakistan and the war in Afghanistan. American Strategy Program Deputy Director Patrick Doherty moderated the discussion. An MP3… more

Anxieties, Anti-Americanism and Expectations of the Next U.S. President

Communications — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 01:15:00 -0400

A New America Event
06/16/2008 - 12:15pm

On June 16, 2008, the New America Foundation hosted a presentation by Bruce Stokes and Richard Wike on the discoveries and implications of the recently released 2008 Pew Global Attitudes Survey. An MP3 audio recording can be downloaded below, while video is available at right. Richard Wike, Associate Director Pew Global Attitudes Project, laid out the primary findings of the report. Overall, the United States has seen modest gains in its perception around the world, with ten surveyed nations… more

The Joe Lunch Bucket Strategy

Ron Tang — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 08:52:00 -0400

If Americans are such huge fans of big dreams and high rolling, self-made tycoons and upward mobility, why then do we insist on seeing our national political elites -- who are also generally our economic and educational elites -- throw back a shot of whiskey or lace up bowling shoes?

Why do we need to pretend that high-flying politicians who graduated from the fanciest schools and dine at the toniest restaurants really don't live in a different world and -- dare I say it -- class than the rest of us?

The easy answer is that we want to identify with them, and we want them to identify with us. But there's also something more at play here, and that's the never-ending tension between our cherished ideologies of mobility and equality.

We don't want to think about the real shape of class in America. Who fits where in the hierarchy has always been a touchy, even embarrassing, issue, and when it is discussed, it's usually in harsh, moralistic tropes about the haves and have nots that do nothing to illuminate nuances.

It's long been an enduring quirk of American politics that the most successful politicians are the ones who best conceal the very hauteur that gives them the supreme confidence -- or is it gall? -- to think they can lead the most powerful nation on Earth. Ironically, the pols who started at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder often feel most obliged to strike a humble pose. As political scientist Elliot White wrote in 1971, "The greater the distance traveled, the greater the pretense of not having gone far at all."

Sure, high-ranking politicians of humble origins can lay at least some claim to being "common." But that's really a ruse. Because the best politicians wouldn't get as far as they do if they hadn't already successfully convinced large numbers of people that they were distinct from -- read: better than -- the rest of us.

And therein lies our dilemma. We hold to the belief that we are all equal, yet we yearn for distinctiveness for ourselves and those we choose to represent us. In a nation whose form of government exalts the illusion of uniformity among its citizens, we are collectively engaged in a struggle to be recognized as unique by our peers.

Alexis de Tocqueville was one of a handful of observers who made the link between an exalted American belief in equality and a much more mundane attitude -- vanity.

Here's how it works. The ideology of equality, which teaches us that every man is just as good as the next, appeals to our pride. We cling to this belief even as experience in our everyday lives proves to us that it is not true. We are quite aware of the fact that some people achieve greater success than others; some are rich and some are poor. But that only makes us adhere to our belief all the more. As Czech scholar Petr Lom has suggested, "the dogma of equality" takes hold of the imagination and gives us hope that we really are equal to everyone. It fuels our dreams that we can be, will be (and therefore magically that we are) just the same as those who have achieved more money, fame or status than ourselves.

Democratic strategist and political analyst Doug Schoen concurs. Having worked with such billionaire candidates as Jon Corzine (New Jersey governor) and Michael Bloomberg (New York mayor), Schoen believes Americans want to perceive even the most successful people as Everyman. "We want wealthy and famous people to be different from us," he said. "But we also want them to be the same."

He advises wealthy candidates to buy "bio spots to tell their story" and demonstrate that story's connection to ordinary peoples' life experiences. "Voters need to see that they are accessible," he said. "That they're not disconnected."

This "connection" evidently elicits a sense of aspiration among voters, whereas a disconnect can create envy. A person steeped in democratic values who cannot aspire to be equal to his social superior is likely to seek equality in another way, by bringing the mighty down to his own level -- another great American tradition.

So the next time you see a presidential candidate make a fool of himself or herself by pretending to be Mr. or Mrs. Average American, remember -- he or she isn't simply trying to curry favor or empathize with us commoners. The gutter balls and the whiskey shots are less about persuading the voters of the candidates' genuine humility (the moments are so awkward, does anyone really find them authentic?) than they are about self-defense. What these elite politicians are really doing is trying to keep the American public from ever bringing them down to size.

Iran's Election: What the Polling Says

Communications — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 04:30:00 -0400

A New America Event
03/14/2008 - 9:30am

When the Iranian people vote for their parliamentary representatives on Friday, March 14, the results may be surprising. But will the rising dissatisfaction with the government and an increased desire for compromise with the United States translate into change? The New America Foundation's American Strategy Program along with Terror Free Tomorrow, a leading non-partisan public opinion research organization, will discuss the full results of TFT's most recent poll of Iranian public attitudes. For more information see Robin… more

Engine of Assimilation

adminn — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 19:25:00 -0500

Americans have little confidence that assimilation is happening today as it once did. According to a 2006 Pew Research Center poll, 44 percent of Americans believe that today's immigrants are not as willing to assimilate as those who came during the early 1900s. Their confidence is not likely to grow with the release of a new Pew Hispanic Center report, which shows that by 2050 nearly 1 in 5 people in the United States will be foreign-born. Nativists, such as columnist Patrick J. Buchanan, who has gone so far as to claim that the refusal of immigrants to assimilate is contributing to a state of emergency for American culture, are spurring this lack of confidence. What is prevailing is a one-eyed view that ignores the central principle of immigrant assimilation: It is an engine that runs on economic opportunity.

Our collective lack of confidence in assimilation stems from the fact that we have forgotten how it works. We tend to think that assimilation is born of a sudden decision, or that it is driven by some sort of epiphanic realization that assimilation is a smart choice. This misreading of assimilation gives rise to commonly heard refrains as, "Immigrants don't want to assimilate," "Why don't they assimilate like my ancestors did?" and "They just want to keep to themselves instead of becoming American."

In actuality, assimilation is a multigenerational process that unfolds as individuals pursue their economic aspirations. Assimilation is, in fact, a story of unintended consequences resulting from this pursuit. If we look closely, we can see the story being written everywhere. Assimilation is starting to take place in the life of a Dominican maid who comes to the United States for a better life, inches along the road of advancement, and gets a better job. She moves to a better neighborhood, where there may be fewer people of her ethnicity.

Assimilation is evident in the daughter of Vietnamese refugees. She works at a high-tech company, where she met her future husband, the great-grandson of Irish immigrants.

The grandson of Mexican farmworkers, knowing full well the economic advantages that come with more education, is attending college, where he is making lifelong friendships with an ethnically mixed crowd.

Assimilation can be seen inside a suburban home, where a Filipino immigrant and his high-school sweetheart, the granddaughter of Italian immigrants, are raising their two daughters. For all of these people, and millions of others like them, the pursuit of economic success inadvertently makes their ethnic origins a decreasingly important factor in how they conduct their lives -- how they choose their friends, their mates and their neighborhood.

And so the story of American assimilation should be regarded first as a tale of economic advancement -- moving to a new neighborhood, going to college, getting a better job, intermarrying -- and secondarily as a story about identity. Sociologists Richard Alba and Victor Nee summarize it best when they write that assimilation is "something that frequently happens to people while they are making other plans."

Of course, not everyone moves up the ladder. Some families remain stuck in poverty-stricken neighborhoods where there are too few pathways to economic success, and therefore too few chances to assimilate. Children grow up in poverty, and overcrowded and underfunded schools leave them ill prepared to compete in an economy that rewards brains far more than brawn. The consequences of squelched economic opportunity are all too apparent. Economic insecurity in the home and a lack of opportunities in school combine to drive some children of immigrants to underachieve.

Assimilation is not a choice. It is what comes about when people have the opportunity to improve their economic position. And so we are wasting our breath with demands that people hurry up and learn English to become American. Assimilation will happen when we power its engine. That means bringing to bear those forces that improve and increase educational and economic opportunities. Assimilation will proceed when we increase funding for schools and after-school programs in areas with large immigrant populations, expand state and federal grants that make college more affordable, improve vocational programs for those who are not college-bound, and expand internship programs that broaden the horizons of new Americans. Measures such as these help ensure that immigrants and their descendents have a chance to make other plans.

The American Public and the Next Social Contract

Next Social Contract — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 11:21:00 -0500

The first premise of the New America Foundation’s initiative on the Next Social Contract is that the structures that help American workers and their families balance economic security and opportunity involve much more than a set of government programs. What we call the social contract is a set of formal and informal systems and assumptions, involving individuals, employers and government, that provide, as Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. put it, “security in the context of freedom and freedom in the context of security.” These assumptions have evolved through the course of American history, shaped by the crises and historical accidents from which they were born. Together, they are rooted in the deepest ethical and social principles of our founding and our sense of American identity.

But the social contract is not merely a creation of the past. It depends on the continuing consent of the governed in the present. Every political battle over domestic or economic policy has been in some sense a measure of public attitudes about those aspects of the social contract that we are ready to change and those that we still consider important. Public opinion both reflects the evolution of the social contract (as in, for example, the abiding support for Social Security, both as a program and a symbolic legacy of New Deal reforms) and maps out what is possible in the next evolution of the social contract.

However, the relationship between public opinion and public policy is neither literal nor direct. We live under many laws that, if put to a direct vote, would be resoundingly defeated. Others reflect a general preference, such as for tax cuts, but are implemented in ways that fail to represent the views of the median voter. Some represent the strongly held views of a minority, along with the reluctant consent of the rest, while others protect critically important minority rights. Many laws simply reflect the temper and political mood of another era, which have yet to be challenged or changed. Our political institutions are not entirely democratic, and the idiosyncrasies of the Senate, the federal budget process, and the winner-take-all nature of our elections all distort policies.

At the same time, we often find policies that seem to enjoy majority support suffer defeat, even without the intervening distortions of political institutions. For example, ideas that perform well in polls are often defeated in ballot initiatives, when opponents are able to tap into underlying values that lead voters to fear change.

So in looking at the relationship between public opinion and the social contract, we have sought not to look at public support for particular programs, but instead at the deeper values that would animate public debate about change. For example, we know that a majority of Americans would strongly favor measures to provide access to health care for all, but we also know -- from experience -- that if a universal health policy is described as expanding government’s role in health care, it will provoke a backlash.

So the task of rebuilding the American social contract for the future will require a deep understanding of the deepest attitudes of Americans -- attitudes about community, government, and family, about our obligations to one another, and about the mutual responsibilities of employers and workers. Rather than commissioning original research on public opinion about policy proposals that are so new that voters are unlikely to have a view on them, we decided that the first step would be to look at what we know from existing research about the underlying attitudes that will shape the reaction to policy proposals when they do come forward.

While analysts sometimes look at two public attitudes and say that they are contradictory, in fact there is usually a way to understand the complex of opinions and see how they can fit together. That fit often illuminates the policies that will win public support and provides a guide for how to talk about those policies. So, for example, in this paper Cliff Zukin and his colleagues note that there is an increasing acceptance of the need for mutual support and an active role for government, coupled with continued skepticism of government programs. But as he points out, the data show a deep commitment to the “golden value” of equality of opportunity. Americans favor self-reliant entrepreneurs over gargantuan corporations, but they mistrust the government to set a level playing field. These tensions shed light on a perpetual interplay between the enduring American values of independence, opportunity, and security.

One of the paradoxes of public policy in recent years has been the wide public support for tax cuts and other policies that principally benefit a small percentage of households. Some attribute this result to political misdirection or the use of social wedge issues; others detect a belief by most Americans that they might soon be rich themselves. Zukin and his colleagues, however, employ data to argue that Americans accept inequality as part of the normal order in a dynamic economy. This finding serves as a warning against a kind of populist model of the social contract, emphasizing the illegitimate gains of the wealthy. Any social contract -- and really any market economy with any set of rules -- is redistributive by nature. But instead of redistribution for the sake of equal outcomes, Americans prefer to guarantee a minimum quality of life and a basic platform of opportunity.

But public opinion is not static, and the project of rebuilding the American social contract is not going to be completed tomorrow. The values driving public opinion will evolve in three ways. First, they will evolve as generations shift. The New Deal generation is passing on, the Baby Boomers moving into retirement, and a younger generation with very different values -- more tolerant, more open to collective action, but also skeptical of large institutions and employers -- are moving into voting-age adulthood. Second, as the economy changes, whether through a wrenching recession or because employers continue to reduce health benefits, Americans may change their basic perception of the role of government, responsibilities of individuals, and expectations of employers. And, finally, leadership and language matter. A president or other public leaders who speak about the social contract in compelling ways that connect to Americans’ basic values can also guide those values in a new direction.

As the initiative goes forward, we will set out to learn more about the first two of those three, looking more closely at the emerging generation -- the “millennials” -- and at changing attitudes about the workforce and employment. As to the third, no research can help us predict whether that leadership or language will be found, but it is our hope that the solid empirical research of the Next Social Contract initiative, together with pathbreaking policy ideas, will help shape it.

-- Foreword by Mark Schmitt, Senior Fellow, New America Foundation.

For the full text of Zukin's research paper, or the detailed appendices, please see the PDFs attached below.

The 'Something for Nothing' State

Ron Tang — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0500

You could see California's 2008 budget mess coming years ago.

In 2003, it loomed on the horizon, in long-term fiscal projections that Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill published just days before Arnold Schwarzenegger became governor. Without "actions to bring spending and revenues into line," she wrote, California's budget gap in 2008-09 would be "in the range of $10 billion, assuming the [vehicle license fee] increase remains in place, and $15 billion if it is rolled back." Borrowing to cover up the deficit would only put California on "a slippery slope" toward permanent crisis.

Despite Hill's warning, Schwarzenegger rolled back the vehicle fee, then persuaded the Legislature and voters to approve $15 billion in borrowing to close the deficit, which drove up the state's debt service.

In 2005, then-state Treasurer Phil Angelides cautioned that the state's "unprecedented and risky" failure "to balance its budget and end deficit borrowing while the economy is still strong" could push the annual deficit to $9 billion when rising oil prices and the collapse of the housing bubble inevitably slowed the California economy. (Full disclosure: As deputy treasurer, I helped write that report.) "The time to act is now," the report said.

Schwarzenegger and the Legislature didn't.

Why were Hill's prescient budget warnings in 2003 ignored and taxes cut to make things worse? Why didn't the governor and state lawmakers follow Angelides' advice and use the good economic years to set things right before bad times returned?

A lot of explanations get offered. Some blame hyper-partisanship in the Capitol. Others point to the two-thirds vote requirement in the Legislature to pass budgets and raise taxes. Still others finger rampant ballot-box budgeting that locks big pieces of spending into law.

All those interpretations capture part of the story. What they don't explain, however, is why California stays stuck. Voters, after all, could punish politicians for their ideological stubbornness. They could eliminate the two-thirds rule (but when given the chance in 2004, they didn't). They could stop ballot-box budgeting (but they don't). Something is holding them back.

That something is the contradictory mix of preferences and desires that Californians hold in their minds, a mix amplified in the echo chamber of state politics. If the system is broken and stays that way, it's because the way we think about budgeting and priorities is askew.

Consider the proposition that the state spends too much. That's what Schwarzenegger said when he recently announced his proposed budget cuts. But most Californians don't agree.

The main business of state government is to "educate, medicate and incarcerate," to use the words of David Osborne, the author of numerous books on government. More than 80% of California's budget goes to education, healthcare and criminal justice. And by overwhelming margins, Californians -- Democrats and, yes, Republicans too -- want the state to keep spending as much or more than we do now on those public goods, according to numerous statewide surveys conducted by the Public Policy Institute of California. The institute's May survey showed that 90% of Californians said they want the government to spend the same amount or more on K-12 schools, while 87% felt that way about public colleges and universities. When asked about health and human services, 76% of Californians backed spending the same amount or more, while for prisons, the figure was 63%. The surveys also show strong support for more spending on transportation and water projects.

Look around the state -- at English majors teaching high school math and science classes; at an estimated 6.5 million people without health insurance; at congested and crumbling highways; at under-policed streets and overcrowded prisons -- and it's hard to say they are wrong.

Logic might suggest that Californians who want these services and investments must also favor the taxes needed to pay for them. But here's where logic falters and the contradictions begin. The same surveys show that Californians are usually evenly divided on the question of whether they favor raising taxes to pay for the services they want. They oppose most specific tax increases -- such as broadening the sales tax to services. And 71% cheered when Schwarzenegger rolled back the vehicle license fee increase, even though it forced the state to suspend Proposition 98's school spending guarantee for the first time.

How do you square a strong desire to spend and an equally strong desire not to pay for it? Frequently, by magically wishing away the conflict. Yes, Californians want the services, but a majority of them -- again, Democrats and Republicans alike -- tell the pollsters that state spending could be cut by 10% or more without harm. Just get rid of bureaucrats, eliminate waste and ramp up efficiency and everything will be fine.

Unfortunately, this handy belief doesn't fit California's reality. Schwarzenegger admitted as much last week when he scoffed at the idea that stripping "waste, fraud and abuse" out of the state government would go a long way toward closing the budget deficit. State employees aren't "bureaucrats" -- the majority work in universities or public safety, as professors, librarians, prison guards and Highway Patrol officers. And by national standards, there aren't many of them. Only two states have fewer state employees per 10,000 residents than California, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

California gets more out of its public servants than almost any other state. Teachers in our secondary schools instruct the largest classes in the nation. Elementary school class size is above the national average. Only three states have a higher inmate-to-prison-guard ratio. In health, the second-largest budget category, California spends less per MediCal beneficiary than any other large state.

State government could -- and should -- be made more efficient. But even if the productivity of state employees were to grow at the same rate as workers in the private sector, about 2.5% annually, the budget savings would amount to less than $1 billion a year, a fraction of the estimated deficit of $14.5 billion. Staying stuck in wishful thinking and budget turmoil comes with two price tags. One is tangible: the billions in budgetary borrowing, which Schwarzenegger proposes to expand, and all the added interest costs that imposes on taxpayers. Debt-service costs will reach $7 billion next year.

The second, though less tangible, is even more important. While we stay stuck, the world passes us by. Our schools aren't geared to educate the workforce needed in the new economy. The University of California is losing out in the competition for top graduate students. Our tax system isn't built for an economy that delivers most of its rewards to the very rich.

California has big things to talk about and do. But we can't do them until Californians drop "something for nothing" as the state motto, and then insist that their leaders grow up too.

L.A.'s 'Race War' That Isn't

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 13:43:00 -0400

Get this: A new study by three UC Irvine criminologists has concluded that Los Angeles is not on the brink of a major interracial crime wave. Surprised? That’s understandable. Because for the last several years, the media have been increasingly fixated on the specter of black-versus-brown violence.

Last January, a CNN anchorwoman asked a visibly perturbed Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa whether Los Angeles was "in the middle of a race war." That same month, this newspaper published an opinion piece claiming that "Latino ethnic cleansing of African Americans from multiracial neighborhoods" was an "increasingly common trend."

Yes, there have been high-profile incidents of Latino-black violence (mostly involving gang members in and outside of prison), but, as the new study’s authors suggest, those stories tend to be sensationalized in the media to make those crimes seem like the rule rather than the exception. Furthermore, whereas the antics of white thugs are generally treated as unreflective of the opinions of whites at large, the media often interpret the actions of black and Latino criminals as the logical extension of the sentiments of the majority of their law-abiding ethnic brethren.

Granted, the study’s findings are nothing to brag about. A murder is a murder is a murder. But other than "a blip" in black-on-Latino homicides in 2005 and another in Latino-on-black killings in 2006, the study’s authors conclude that there is no upward trend in interracial violent crime.

According to the study, which focused on six years of data from four precincts in the Los Angeles Police Department’s South Bureau, street violence has been overwhelmingly intra-racial rather than interracial. According to scholars John R. Hipp, George E. Tita and Lindsay N. Boggess, "blacks are about 500% more likely to assault a fellow black than a Latino and about 650% more likely to murder a fellow black." For their part, Latino offenders are also much more likely to assault or murder a fellow Latino than an African American.

So why has the media been so quick to embrace the specter of full-scale black-Latino warfare?

Well, let’s face it, newspapers and other media are not above playing on readers’ fears (or maybe even their wishes). In this paper, a January story titled "Racial attacks by gangs rising, L.A. officials fear" ran on the front page, whereas the article on the new study of racial crime was published on the fourth page in Section B.

Still, I suspect there’s more at play than just the mere selling of newspapers. A nationwide Gallup poll in August on race relations may hold some clues. When pollsters inquired about the state of black-white relations, 75% of Anglo respondents said they were either very good or somewhat good. But when asked about black-Hispanic relations, Anglo respondents were much less upbeat, with only 46% describing them positively. The low opinion whites have of Latino-black relations is particularly interesting given that 68% of blacks and 59% of Latinos considered black-Latino relations generally good.

Call me cynical, but I suspect that Anglo race fatigue may be involved in this negative view of the situation. You know what I’m talking about. Over the last generation, a growing number of white Americans have expressed their exasperation with the seeming intractability of racial issues in the U.S.

Does that make whites who feel this way racist? No, not necessarily. But I imagine that plenty of them are eager to consign the issue of race to a new set of players and, indeed, may be relieved that the media’s preoccupation with black versus brown has eclipsed that of white versus black. "They want to say, ‘Look at them. It’s not just us,’ " said essayist Debra Dickerson. "They’re not the guilty ones."

But contemporary black-Latino tensions don’t somehow erase -- or render routine -- the historical divisions between white and black in America. To pretend the two relationships are equivalent is to downplay the official role and legacy of white supremacy in American history. Racial violence committed on society’s edges by marginal black and Latino thugs is not the same as that which was condoned by white elected officials and respected citizens not so very long ago. Correct me if I’m wrong, but large groups of Latino and black family men have not been known to form lynch mobs, and our Mexican American mayor has not barred black students from the city’s schools.

I can’t help thinking that there is some sort of wish fulfillment in the black-versus-brown fixation. But all the wishes in the world won’t erase the legacy of our nation’s painful racial past.

Belgium's Identity Crisis

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 14:26:00 -0400

When you think of international ethnic hot spots, Belgium probably doesn’t jump to mind. Its 10 million inhabitants are relatively prosperous, and its two main ethnic groups, the Flemings and Walloons, with their different languages and cultures, aren’t blowing each other up with car bombs or hacking each other to bits with machetes. But that doesn’t mean Belgium is the model of inter-ethnic cooperation it’s cracked up to be.

Four years ago, outgoing Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt called his nation "the laboratory of European unification." In 1989, then-Prime Minister Wilfried Martens referred to Belgium as "the prototype of Europe." The Federal Belgian State, he proclaimed, "is a prefiguration of a Europe of peoples, united in their organized diversity." And, indeed, by virtue of a culture of political compromise and a mind-boggling, complex and constantly evolving government, for 177 years Belgium has managed not to split apart into its two major constituent pieces -- each with its own language, culture and traditions: the Dutch-speaking Flemings in the north and the French-speaking Walloons in the south.

Belgium, it seems, not only shares its capital, Brussels, with the European Union, it also serves as the latter’s model.

Three short years ago, a United Nations report on "cultural liberty" glibly offered multiethnic Belgium as proof that countries don’t have to "choose between national unity and cultural diversity." But it may have spoken too soon. For more than three months now, an ethnic standoff among the political parties has left Belgium unable to form a new government, and a growing number of Belgians are beginning to wonder what -- other than soccer, frites and a king -- they all have in common.

In July, on Belgium’s national holiday, the prime minister-designate, Yves Leterme, made international news for avoiding the words to the national anthem -- he jokingly began singing the opening line of "The Marseillaise" instead -- and for not knowing what historical event (the inauguration of King Leopold I) the holiday commemorated. His defense? Polls show that only one in five Belgians know why they celebrate July 21.

Right-wing Europeans like to pretend that multiculturalism was born with the arrival of large numbers of Muslim immigrants in the last quarter of the 20th century, but Belgium was a multicultural state long before that. By the 1930s, the Belgian government gave up on the idea of a bilingual nation, in which a country promotes two languages equally, and instead established a regime of "dual monolingualism." Since the 1970s, the once unitary government began to devolve into a federal system in which the constitution allocates power to the three economic regions -- Wallonia, Flanders and Brussels -- and three language communities: French, Dutch and German.

Because it was designed to protect the rights of the country’s three linguistic groups -- the Flemish make up roughly 60% of the population, French speakers 40% and Germans less than 1% -- the political system can best be described as an anti-majoritarian democracy in which power is balanced by proportional ethnic representation, executive power sharing and minority vetoes. Belgium has two separate and distinct political party systems and two electoral colleges, one French-speaking and the other Dutch. The German speakers get worked into the mix via complex formulas.

Though intended to facilitate compromise, the incorporation of linguistic differences into the political system does little to make diverse Belgians feel part of the nation at large. In fact, it only reinforces the sense that the Flemish and the Francophones (not to mention the small minority of German speakers) are entirely separate peoples.

And, not surprisingly, they act that way. Social interaction between the nation’s two largest groups is disappointingly low. So is intermarriage. People not only vote in separate elections, they watch separate television networks and read separate newspapers. Linguistic segregation in schools is also pretty thorough. In Wallonia, for example, only 17% speak passable Dutch in addition to French.

So what has kept this consummately postmodern -- or is it post-national -- country together thus far? The monarchy. But so far during this political crisis, King Albert II’s repeated calls for unity have gone unheeded.

Yet while some Belgians deplore what one Flemish philosopher disdainfully called Belgium’s "identity of non-identity," others embrace it.

Nine years ago, a group of so-called Neo Belgicist intellectuals and artists published an open letter in which they affirmed their opposition to the existence of a single, solid national identity. Precisely because a national identity is nothing to be proud of, they argued, they are proud to be Belgians. In fact, they proclaimed Belgium to be the "antidote to nationalism." And better yet, because it signifies so little, the Belgian state can easily be replaced by a new and broader "non-identity concept" of Europeanness.

But if model little Belgium collapses under the weight of ethnic tensions, what makes them think that the giant European Union will not suffer a similar fate?

Spin Means Always Having to Say You're Sorry

Cecille Isidro — Tue, 01 May 2007 16:49:00 -0400

Who’s sorry now? Lots of people these days are rushing to the cameras, claiming to be misunderstood -- but none of them seems truly regretful.

Saying that one is sorry, of course, is just the beginning. Those who are genuinely apologetic know that repentance is a stern taskmaster. According to Catholic doctrine, for example, "contrition" is "a sorrow of soul and a hatred of sin committed, with a firm purpose of not sinning in the future."

In other words, if you are contrite, you really have to mean it. So we can make short work, then, of Randall Tobias, who, until resigning suddenly Friday, was deputy secretary of State, overseeing, among other concerns, anti-AIDS abstinence programs. The married Tobias admitted to ABC News that he called an escort service "to have gals come over to the condo and give me a massage," but insisted that "no sex" was involved.

But, if the Bush administration believed Tobias’ story, why did he resign? And, if his bosses didn’t believe him, why should the rest of us?

Bottom line: Tobias is not contrite; he does not yet hate the sin he committed, even if his wife might find a way to keep him from committing it again.

Another miscreant who obviously isn’t sincerely sorry is Don Imus, the ex-shock jock. After a career of calling people names, he went over the line in slurring the female Rutgers basketballers. He issued a couple of grudgingly remorseful statements, then announced that he was done with the sorry routine: "I’m going to apologize but we gotta move on."

Unfortunately for Imus, the transgressor can only make his best case for forgiveness. It’s up to the world to decide whether to accept the apology. And, in Imus’ case, it was not accepted because few saw in him a firm purpose never to name-call again.

Next up in the "Sorry/Not Sorry" dock is former CIA Director George Tenet, who collected a $4-million book advance so that he could spin his role in the Iraq War -- specifically, that his now-notorious "slam dunk" phrase was taken out of context.

Well, Tenet said those war-justifying words in December 2002, and yet he just smiled as they were cited by President George W. Bush for the year-and-a-half that he clung to his perch. And Tenet held his tongue when awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in December 2004.

Only now, after all these years of debacle, does he wish to undunk himself from Iraq, because, as he told 60 Minutes, he is now seen as an "idiot." So he’s out to fix that by spinning on TV.

Well, it’s one thing to make a mistake, even a big one. The question is: What does one do about it? If Tenet genuinely hated what he had done, he could give his medal back and donate his book millions to charity. Until that happens, he is just another Beltway operator who failed upward to riches.

Speaking of failing upward, now we come to Tenet’s ex-colleague in the Bush administration, Paul Wolfowitz, who, more than anyone else, dreamed up the Iraq War from his Pentagon ivory tower. Having been kicked upstairs to the World Bank presidency, Wolfowitz now stands accused of finagling the intelligence once again over WMD -- Woman Much Desired.

Wolfowitz says his enemies are out to get him over what he did in Iraq, not over what he is currently doing at the World Bank. That’s for sure. And let that be a lesson to future armchair generals -- if the war you foment goes as badly as this one has, a lot of people will be upset.

So, once again, malefactors should be warned: The road to perdition is short, but the path back to forgiveness is long. And ineptly spinning the media only makes these attempted comebacks laughable, as well as futile.