In 1998, when I ran the American Chamber of Commerce in China (no relation to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington), we had a dinner that had about ten or twelve speakers, a mix of Senators, Congressmen, and Cabinet Secretaries. Sen. Jay Rockefeller, one of the last to speak that night, started his remarks by quoting “Tip” O’Neill, the Speaker of the House from 1977-87. He said, “ It has come to that point in the evening where everything that needs to be said has been said, but not everyone has had a chance to say it.” A great line that I’ve borrowed before. So now its my turn to sound off about an Op-Ed piece published by the New York Times a few weeks ago.
The New York Times, my favorite newspaper, does a lot of things right. But it still makes some big blunders. In my humble opinion, the Editorial Pages are a weak spot. Too little quality control. Too little discipline (poorly thought out columns, based -- all too often -- on misinformation or even a certain lazy ignorance that still results in opinions that the Times willingly publishes). A case in point is the opinion piece published on November 10th, “To Save Our Economy, Ditch Taiwan”, by a guy named Paul Kane. That’s right, Kane advocates that the U.S. government sell Taiwan to the Peoples Republic of China in exchange for that portion of U.S. debt held by China, some US$1.15 trillion. In case you were wondering, that works out to about US$50 per person. Taiwanese aren’t cheap. A potential complication to this idiotic and shortsighted proposal is that Taiwan itself is the seventh largest sovereign U.S. debt holder. I guess Beijing would inherit that debt as part of the sale. Its not, literally, a sale, but its close enough.
Kane makes the case that military alliances are SOOOOO 1960’s that looking at the world in any way other than in terms of economics is just silly (I guess that’s why we’ve got Marines in Australia now, huh?). He says that the Chinese leadership would be startled by such a move by the U.S. Of all the assertions in his article, this is the only one that seems correct. Beijing would certainly be startled; then they would close the big red doors of Zhongnanhai so they could laugh in private. Then they would politely reject the deal. Why? Because they think Taiwan will “return home" on its own”, especially now that Chen Shui Bian is so discredited and the Guomendong government of Ma Yingjeou are shuttling back and forth from Taipei to Beijing. Why buy something at an inflated price when you can probably get it for free with a little patience? Whatever else one can say about the government of China (and there’s quite a bit), they are not stupid, not impatient, nor are they insensitive to Chinese public opinion. If they relinquished all of their U.S. Treasuries, the domestic criticism would be almost overwhelming. There’s nothing in this deal for the Chinese.
But that’s not at the crux of Kane’s fantasy. He proposes this as a fix-it solution for the U.S. In the unlikely prospect that this would be successful, it would wipe out almost 7% of U.S. Government debt. Quite obviously, that still leaves behind more than 90% of the debt burden. To suggest that the U.S. economy would see lasting benefit is, to say the least, mistaken. U.S economic security would not see any lasting benefit. Besides that, the image of the U.S. as a reliable and consistent ally would take a severe beating. Or not; more likely, it would just completely go away. Sort of like what would happen if the Obama turned over the entire State Dept. to Goldman Sachs. Most people would look at this idiocy as a shameful and selfish act of national desperation. After Taiwan, the U.S. could sell Israel to the Saudis, then Saudi Arabia itself to the Iranians. Would Putin be interested in Canada? Worth a shot, maybe. After all, what are friends for?
Would it help President Obama get re-elected? My guess is that it would backfire badly. Sort of like promising to appoint Ron Paul as Secretary of State, Rand Paul as Attorney General and Grover Norquist as Treasury Secretary.
It all sort of makes me wonder why Kane wrote his Op-Ed piece in the first place. He says, in his own defense, that it was meant as a satirical approach to the problems facing the United States. Kind of hard to believe, in that satire is generally identifiable as such, at least by the end of an article. He says it was meant to be provocative. He’s succeeded, of course. My guess is that he’d like to be seen as an authority on foreign and/or domestic policy (he tries, after all, to meld both with a simple -- or simple-minded -- “one size fits all” solution). If that was an aim, I think he’s damaged his own cause. Maybe his brain got a bit rattled as a Marine in Iraq. Or he’s spent too much time at Harvard. He may be eligible for the Larry Summers Award, given annually (by me) to the author of a public policy proposal most likely to have been designed with total disregard for the real world.
To be taken seriously, you have to do something (or write something) that’s worth taking seriously. “. . . Ditch Taiwan” is not deserving of anything except ridicule. Let’s hope no one takes it or its author seriously.
