In the movie, Far and Away, there is a scene where Tom Cruise (Joseph Donnelly) tells Nicole Kidman (Shannon Something) in a perfectly articulated Irish accent, “America has got so much land they’re givin’ it away for free.”  Her response is to express incredulity.  To which Joseph replies with something like, “You’re a corker, Shannon.”  The movie then proceeds to a climax where they race to claim their free land in a post-Louisiana-Purchase land grab.  Ahhh! the good ole days when the federal government had so much land they were giving it away for free.

About 524 million acres

The size of the Louisiana Purchase was 524 million acres.  Most of this land is now privately owned.  It would be hard to argue that America would be as prosperous and powerful today, if this “Breadbasket of the world” was managed by federal bureaucrats.  Because this land is managed by private owners and corporate interests, America has been a significant exporter of food and has been able to feed its people with abundance with few minor exceptions.  When you have a country that is geographically capital rich in its ability to feed its people, this frees its population to engage in other industrious activities like building microchips, aircraft carriers, and entitlement programs.  You would think that with such a clear historical example of the virtues of private ownership of land, that the federal government would have continued this trend during the rest of the Westward expansion.  With the exception of Texas, this hasn’t been the case for the rest of the West.

Go West, Paradise is there...

The Louisiana Purchase was a massive acquisition for the United States Government.  However, the federal government’s current land holdings, mostly in the West, dwarf the Louisiana Purchase in size.  The federal government currently controls 623 million acres.  In Martin L. Gross’ book, National Suicide: How Washington is Destroying the American Dream from A to Z, he discusses the negative impact that the federal mismanagement of these lands has on the respective states.  He mentions a current real estate boom in Arizona, California, and Nevada, where solar energy companies are trying to develop solar energy plants as a response to generous subsidies from Washington.  The Bureau of Land Management, however, halted this development to wait for environmental impact studies.  We can only hope that these environmental impact studies are conducted with the same scientific rigor and discipline as the University of East Anglia’s climatology department.  Needless to say, what this travesty reveals is that the reason our country isn’t energy dependent isn’t because we don’t have the technology and resources to make it happen.  We are dependent on foreign oil imports because our lands with the most energy resources are located in the West on lands owned by the federal government.  One of the primary reasons we are dependent on foreign debt imports, is because our capital rich and resource rich geography is being severely mismanaged.  Anyone with basic knowledge of finance knows that if your overextended with your credit, then it is time to start liquidating assets.  It would be a great idea for the U.S. to sell its massive holdings of Western land to private American enterprises, individuals and State Governments as a means of reducing our national debt.  However, in order for a change of this magnitude to happen, we need leaders who recognize this opportunity.  My friend, Michael S. Lee, is considering running for the Senate in Utah to replace Bob Bennett.  He has this to say about the constitutionality of the federal government holding such a large portion of western land:

In light of the text and history of Article I, Section 8, Clause 17, there is a valid basis for questioning whether federal land should be exempt from taxation by the host State where, as is often the case, the host State’s legislature has not given Congress exclusive legislative jurisdiction over that land. While a broader power could be (and has been) inferred from Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2—which authorizes Congress to “dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States”—that provision says nothing about exclusive legislative jurisdiction. For that reason, in order to read Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2 as giving Congress boundless discretion over federal land (i.e., as authorizing Congress to act as a sovereign with respect to land acquired by the federal government within a State, but without the consent of that State’s legislature), one must essentially ignore the “legislative consent” language of Article I, Section 8, Clause 17. The best way to reconcile Article I, Section 8, Clause 17 with Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2 is to conclude that (1) the former authorizes Congress to control federal land as a sovereign—such that Congress may dictate that federal land is exempt from all taxation and regulation by the host State—but only if the host State’s legislature has consented to such an arrangement, while (2) the latter authorizes Congress to control federal land to the extent permitted by the generally applicable laws of the host State—such that Congress may not prohibit the host State from taxing and regulating federal land to the same degree that it taxes and regulates private property—but does not require Congress to obtain the consent of the host State’s legislature.

In many instances, the host State would gladly give the consent described in Article I, Section 8, Clause 17, authorizing Congress to exercise exclusive legislative jurisdiction over certain federal lands. In Utah, for example, I suspect that the legislature might freely give such consent with respect to the land comprising Hill Air Force Base, the Utah Testing and Training Range, and Zion’s National Park. But in other instances, Utah’s legislature would be reluctant to give such consent, recognizing that—because the federal government owns nearly 70% of the land in the State—the State would suffer (as it does now) if all federal lands were exempt from taxation. There are a number of factors that the legislature would want them to consider in deciding whether to relinquish control over the various parcels of federal land. But the important point is that this decision would belong—and consistent with the text and history of the Constitution, should belong—to the legislature of the host State, and not to Congress.

Unfortunately, the Supreme Court reached the opposite conclusion in Kleppe v. New Mexico, 426 U.S. 529 (1976), essentially ignoring (and effectively obliterating) the important textual distinction between the power granted by Article I, Section 8, Clause 17, and that granted by Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2. That decision needs to be revisited, given how severely it undermines the legitimate, sovereign, and constitutionally protected interests of States—especially those in which the federal government owns a significant amount of land. It may well be that Congress (rather than the Supreme Court) is in the best position to undo the injustice brought about by Kleppe v. New Mexico. Congress could do so by enacting a law providing that, absent the consent of the host State’s legislature, the federal government owns land within a State on the same footing as any other property owner within that State, and not as a sovereign exempt from taxation and regulation.

I know that it is a radical idea to be electing people to Congress that have knowledge of the Constitution.  I will close by quoting what Martin Gross thinks we should do:

Because Washington has shown that it cannot manage these lands in the best interests of either the states or the nation, citizens should demand the return of all mineral rights, including oil and gas, back from Washington to the states.  They can then develop them properly by calling on commercial leaseholds, which will bring the states enormous royalties.

This is only fair because the rights were taken away from the former territories years ago, when they were too weak to fight Washington.

As a result of such arrogant federal mismanagement, debate should start on the final objective.  We should return all federal land – except for national parks – to the states so that they, and the American people can reap the harvest of our own good earth.

In Barack Obama’s brave new caste system, profiteers have quickly become the untouchables.  Much of the debate over healthcare can be reductively boiled down to the fact that those who are more liberal think that it is immoral for a company to profit off of the health of another person.  Most conservatives don’t care about this, and tend to think it is more immoral for the government to even hint at taking an even larger role in the health care system when its financial track record in the health care systems that it already runs are so dismal.  Since liberals are currently running the government and a large portion of the media, it hasn’t taken long for a climate to develop in the country where making a profit is seen as a grievous sin and recklessly spending public finances through record deficit spending is seen as a virtuous act.

It’s nice to see that this new change in attitude hasn’t been lost on the treasury department.  Earlier this week, there were several news stories about certain institutions paying back their TARP money.  They were even going to pay back the money with some interest, hence the taxpayers were making a profit.  However, yesterday we learned that the wise stewards of TARP haven’t been the great investors the original stories made them out to be.  According to this story, a recent audit shows that taxpayers are showing a loss of $61 billion dollars on just the AIG and auto company bailouts.  This loss wipes out the $19.5 billion profit reported earlier this week.

TARP

If a publicly traded private company engaged in this kind of behavior, it would be investigated for securities fraud.  If the public company of our government, whose stock is privately traded among various special interest groups, engages in this kind of financial reporting, nobody cares.  Also, if a company with a $700 billion market cap reported a $40 billion loss in one year, the market’s reaction would be swift and painful.  If Obama & Bush inc. loses this much money, there’s not much that can be done.  After all, there was so much resounding shareholder…I mean taxpayer support for Obama to buy off his supporters in the UAW with the auto bailout, that this is a bad investment that we are all going to have to live with.

Most presidents get out of office and build a library or something.  Obama should start an investment bank.

I am going to have to cut Barack Obama some slack for the unemployment rate being so high.  After all, it isn’t the job of the President of the United States to make sure that Americans are working.  It also isn’t the job of University professors, and even though they might think they are helping to employ people, job creation isn’t something that labor unions have much prowess for.  So I guess, the American public should be a little bewildered that the aforementioned groups of people convened this week to discuss how to create jobs.  Ultimately, what this little conference proves is that Obama doesn’t have a clue how to create jobs.  Or, to be fair, he doesn’t know how to advance his agenda and create jobs, since his policy agenda and job creation are fixed in diametric opposition.  Therefore, he is creating the illusion that he cares about creating jobs, but he has no real intentions to enact policies that will actually result in jobs being created.

On the other hand, Mitt Romney, published ten things that should be done to start creating jobs now in an article in the USA Today.  Of course, he is just advancing the same tired ideas that got us into this mess.  He and all of his rich corporate buddies.  What do they know about creating jobs?  For what it’s worth, here is the list:

• Repair the stimulus. Freeze the funds that haven’t yet been spent and redirect them to immediate, private sector job-creation priorities.

• Create tax incentives that promote business expansion and hiring. For example, install a robust investment tax credit, permit businesses to expense capital purchases made in 2010, and reduce payroll taxes. These will reignite construction, technology and a wide array of capital goods industries, and lead to expanded employment.

• Prove to the global investors that finance America’s debt that we are serious about reining in spending and becoming fiscally prudent by adopting limits on non-military discretionary spending and reforming our unsustainable, unfunded entitlements. These are key to strengthening the dollar, reducing the threat of rampant inflation and holding down interest rates.

• Close down any talk of carbon cap-and-trade. It will burden consumers and employers with billions in new costs. Instead, greatly expand our commitment to natural gas and nuclear, boosting jobs now and reducing the export of energy jobs and dollars later.

• Tell the unions that job-stifling “card check” legislation is off the table. Laying new burdens on small business will kill entrepreneurship and job creation.

• Don’t allow a massive tax increase to go into effect in 2011 with the expiration of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts. The specter of more tax-fueled government spending and the reduction of capital available for small business will hinder investment and business expansion.

• New spending should be strictly limited to items that are critically needed and that we would have acquired in the future, such as new military equipment to support our troops abroad and essential infrastructure at home.

• Install dynamic regulations for the financial sector — rules that are up to date, efficient and not excessively burdensome. But do not so tie up the financial sector with red tape that we lose a vital component of our economic system.

• Open the doors to trade. Give important friends like Colombia favored trade status rather than bow to protectionist demands. Now is the time for aggressive pursuit of opportunities for new markets for American goods, not insular retrenchment.

• Stop frightening the private sector by continuing to hold GM stock, by imposing tighter and tighter controls on compensation, and by pursuing a public insurance plan to compete with private insurers. Government encroachment on free enterprise is depressing investment and job creation.

The thing I hate about Russians is how quickly they jump to conclusions.  For example, last week, an unexplicable explosion caused a train wreck in Russia.  Despite the fact that a lot of things cause explosions, Russian reporters quickly rushed to the following conclusion:

The worst terrorist attack to hit the Russian heartland in five years was almost certainly engineered by Islamist extremists, who are increasingly active in Russia’s volatile northern Caucasus region, say analysts.

First of all, they assume that it was a terrorist attack.  It could have easily been a man-made disaster.  It is also disappointing that they blamed Islamist extremists.  Where is CRIR (Council for Russian Islamic Relations) denouncing these blanket accusations.  It is a little disturbing that the Russian press would not take an apologist stance and try and figure out how Russians themselves are to blame for this little mishap with the train.  After all, Vladimir Putin has yet to travel to the heart of the Muslim world and make a spectacular apology to the Muslims for the centuries of mistreatment at the hand of the Russians.  They get what they deserve.

A man-made disaster

If you compare the Russian response to what could have easily been a mere act of spontaneous combustion, to the American media’s response to the Fort Hood human-caused disaster we learn a valuable truth about terrorism:  Terrorism lies in the eye of the beholder.  The United States hasn’t had a terrorist attack on its soil since 9/11, because we have stopped calling these man-made disasters terrorist attacks.  Problem solved.

Meanwhile, it was only a few short weeks ago that I read the following report on Stratfor:

In the 11th edition of the online magazine Sada al-Malahim (The Echo of Battle), which was released to jihadist Web sites last week, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) leader Nasir al-Wahayshi wrote an article that called for jihadists to conduct simple attacks against a variety of targets. The targets included “any tyrant, intelligence den, prince” or “minister” (referring to the governments in the Muslim world like Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Yemen), and “any crusaders whenever you find one of them, like at the airports of the crusader Western countries that participate in the wars against Islam, or their living compounds, trains etc.,” (an obvious reference to the United States and Europe and Westerners living in Muslim countries).

Al-Wahayshi, an ethnic Yemeni who spent time in Afghanistan serving as a lieutenant under Osama bin Laden, noted these simple attacks could be conducted with readily available weapons such as knives, clubs or small improvised explosive devices (IEDs). According to al-Wahayshi, jihadists “don’t need to conduct a big effort or spend a lot of money to manufacture 10 grams of explosive material” and that they should not “waste a long time finding the materials, because you can find all these in your mother’s kitchen, or readily at hand or in any city you are in.”

While Al-Wahayshi’s new battle plan would be less-frightening if we were willing to admit that a terrorist attack doesn’t have to always result in a destroyed skyscraper; or if we were more worried about preventing future attacks instead of giving enemy combatants full-constitutional rights and a civilian trial,  at least Al-Wahayshi gives away their plan.  They are going to use materials from your mother’s kitchen.  If we all join together and clean out our mother’s kitchens of anything that could be used in a terrorist attack, we can stop these attacks.  Also, don’t invite Muslims over for dinner.

Killer Jellyfish

The Independent Bloghorn was one of the first to identify that the global warming alarmists were shifting their laser beam focus on the soon to be extinct polar bear to other animals, like the American Pika.  For more on this, you can read Polar Bear Huggers.

I am always on the lookout for stories that focus on how global warming is affecting other carbon based lifeforms.  Apparently the warm oceans is causing Jellyfish populations to surge.  Did I mention that these are killer jellyfish?  Is my prose striking fear in your heart?  It’s not?  Well perhaps you should read a passage from the article published by the AP, written by Michael Casey:

A blood-orange blob the size of a small refrigerator emerged from the dark waters, its venomous tentacles trapped in a fishing net. Within minutes, hundreds more were being hauled up, a pulsating mass crowding out the catch of mackerel and sea bass.

The fishermen leaned into the nets, grunting and grumbling as they tossed the translucent jellyfish back into the bay, giants weighing up to 200 kilograms (450 pounds), marine invaders that are putting the men’s livelihoods at risk.

The venom of the Nomura, the world’s largest jellyfish, a creature up to 2 meters (6 feet) in diameter, can ruin a whole day’s catch by tainting or killing fish stung when ensnared with them in the maze of nets here in northwest Japan’s Wakasa Bay.

Are you scared now?  I sure hope so.  It is not very often that we find professional journalists that are so adept at conjuring up the skills they learned from their freshman creative writing class.  The vivid imagery, tactful alliterations, the incomplete sentence in paragraph 2 all combine to communicate one simple message: Be afraid…Very afraid, of KILLER JELLYFISH.

Fine, I admit it, I am scared.  Please Mr. Casey, tell me there is something that government can do to solve this problem.

Addressing the surge in jellyfish blooms in most places will require long-term fixes, such as introducing fishing quotas and pollution controls, as well as capping greenhouse gas emissions to control global warming, experts said.

Whatever it takes, whatever the costs, I hope we can all do our part to fight back this invasion.

“Coming down to it, I believe our fundamental disagreement to be this: that I trust disinterested and probably more incompetent government who have no profit motive more than I trust private corporations and conglomerates.”

-Chuckles

I can respect Chuckles’ ability to distill what is probably the essence behind most of the current health care debate.  I can also agree that private/public corporations and conglomerates with their “evil” profit motives will do some things that a lot of people will find reprehensible.

However, the power of private/public corporations and conglomerates to do these reprehensible things is severely limited by the very profit motive that makes them so “evil.”  Their evilness can only be prolonged as long as they are able to make a profit.  Ultimately, their growth, power, and influence is going to be determined by whether they can create value for society or not.

Governments, on the other hand, operate by a different set of rules.  For a good example of the complete failure that  government’s disinterested incompetence can lead to, we can look at the usual suspect: California.

This week lawmakers in California authorized the government to withhold 10% of everyone’s paychecks to cover their budget shortfall.  As evil as they are, private insurance companies cannot perform acts such as this.  This is only the fourth or fifth time in the last year that lawmakers in California have raised taxes to close their budget shortfalls, and this will only be the fourth or fifth time that recent tax increases have resulted in lower than expected tax revenues.  They keep raising taxes, and the amount of tax dollars coming in keeps shrinking.  Democrats and liberals will try suggest that the era of Reagan is over, and it is time to remake the economy.  The problem with this thinking is that economic laws can’t be changed by legislative will, e.g. you can’t legislate away the scarcity of an economy’s resources.  There seems to be enough historical examples, of which California is just the latest, where increasing taxes during a recession only accelerates the downward spiral of decreasing overall tax revenues.  The most recent Californian tax increase is absolutely criminal, and I guess I can’t understand why the same people that are livid about an insurance company making a profit will give disinterested, incompetent governments a free pass.

Given the current abuse Californians are receiving from their disinterested, incompetent government my objections to Obama’s current health care plan boil down to the fact that I don’t believe that Obama’s supporters can adequately answer the following questions:

• What evidence do you have that democrats’ health plan will be successful?  Please! Point me to the government model of success that I can look at and say, if they run this the same way, we’ll be fine.
• What is the exit strategy for the possibility that things get worse?  Let’s say Obamacare passes, and health costs don’t go down, joblessness increases, private insurers do go out of business, people stop wanting to go into the field of medicine, etc.  I am not saying that I think all of these things will happen, but I do believe that the likelihood of a variety of negative consequences resulting from this bill is very high.  In fact, the potential for these “reforms” to cause a lot of damage is a lot more likely in my opinion than that the earth will be destroyed by Carbon Dioxide.  Once again, I am not saying that I have fallen off the fearmongering cliff, but I am asking for an exit strategy.
• Disinterested incompetence?  Really?  This is the impetus behind your hope and change?  This is what you think will solve problems?
• Why try to do this all at once?  The whole health-care reform issue comes across as a big, expensive power grab to me rather than a sincere desire to solve legitimate problems.  If there is a a couple hundred billion dollars worth of waste and fraud in Medicare, let’s go fix that.  Once it is fixed, and we can see that one of the government’s largest entitlement program isn’t careening towards bankruptcy, then let’s talk about how we can use some of the same intelligence and expertise that fixed that problem to help those who are currently uninsured.

Barack Obama gave future presidential hopefuls a clinic last fall on how to run for president.  You begin by writing a memoir about yourself.  Some might say that a memoir is something that is written after you have accomplished something, but Obama has proven that this genre can be bent to be used for the purpose of creating a mythos around your character that can be very useful in an election.  Of course Obama wasn’t the first political messiah to write a hero narrative for himself to get elected.  Mein Kampf is probably the most notable example from recent history.  After seeing how easily this campaign strategy enabled Barack Obama to beat her running mate, it is pretty clear that Sarah Palin is taking the lessons she learned from campaigning against Obama to position herself as a messianic rival to the current chosen one.

Going Rogue

Her memoir, Going Rogue, will have a first printing run of 1.5 million.  To put things in perspective, The Audacity of Hope, sold 200,000 copies in 2007.  By the time Obama was elected each of his books had finally sold a million copies.  Regardless of how you feel about Sarah Palin, her faux memoir is probably going to sell more copies in 3 months than Obama’s 2 books have sold in 3 years.

Selling a lot of books, however, isn’t the only indication of Palin’s rise.  Unlike Obama, when she speaks, results follow.  For example, how long have we been listening to Obama speak about healthcare.  Has it only been 6 short months of incessant, ubiquitous, incomprehensible speeches?  What are the results?  We have 5?  Or is it 6? bills?  How many thousands of pages?  How many speeches?  And where are we?

Palin on the other hand, posts a microblog, and the world listens.  Palin gets David Letterman to apologize to her daughter, a feat only matched by his cuckolded wife.  And most lately, Palin is determining who wins political elections.  Dede Scozzafava was comfortably winning her congressional race in the 23rd district of New York.  Then Palin endorsed her rival from the conservative party, Dan Hoffman.  Not less than two weeks later, Scozzafava is backing out of the race and throwing her support to Hoffman.  Whether you like Palin or not, with her we can at least get a glimpse of what leadership looks like.  Barack Obama, on the other hand is throwing the Democrat gubernatorial candidate in Virginia under the bus.

Republican critics from within the party and from outside, have complained for a while now that the party has lost its way, and has therefore become an obstructionist party with no solutions of their own.  By going rogue, Sarah Palin might be playing a crucial role in helping the party find its new face, and here it is:

The Bean Counter

I haven’t been following this race very closely, but on the surface I can tell you one reason why Hoffman is a great candidate: He is an ACCOUNTANT.  If the trend of replacing Washington’s career politicians and lawyers with practiced and principled accountants can be replicated 100 times across the country, conservatives might have something to look forward to next year.  Every district in the country needs a nerdy, conservative, bean counter running with the simple message, “We can’t afford this.”

The fact that Sarah Palin is the one who gets this tells me that Obama better watch out, or we might get a new Messiah in Chief.

If I had to pick someone who tends to be more liberal than myself that I tend to agree with more than most other liberals, it would have to be Thomas Friedman.  In his column this week, he included the following quote from Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki:

“The most dangerous thing that would threaten others is that if we really create success in building a democratic state in Iraq,” said Maliki, whose country today now has about 100 newspapers. “The countries whose regimes are built on one party, sect or ethnic group will feel endangered.”

The most interesting part of this quote to me is that Friedman feels the need to mention that Iraq now has 100 newspapers.  I don’t know how many newspapers Iraq used to have under Saddam’s rule, but I imagine the answer would have to be one.  This quote also led me to wonder why newspapers are such a hot growth industry in Iraq, but they are floundering business disasters from coast to coast in the United States.  I also found Friedman’s statement to be even more interesting when juxtaposed with a quote about the Obama administration’s recent assault on Fox News from one of my other favorite columnists, Mark Steyn:

The most recent whine – the anti-Fox campaign – is, apart from anything else, unbecoming to the office. President Obama is the chief of state of one of the oldest free societies in the world, but his official White House Web site runs teasers such as: “For even more Fox lies, check out the latest ‘Truth-O-Meter.’” It gives off the air of somebody only marginally less paranoid than this week’s president-for-life in some basket-case banana republic ranting on the palace balcony because his interior security chief isn’t doing a fast-enough job of disappearing his enemies.

I don’t need to get into a Fox vs. the rest of the media debate here.  This, to me, comes down to one simple question: which country is more American, Iraq or America?  We should be proud of our troops for what is likely the right answer to this question, and we should be embarrassed by the Obama administration for creating an environment where this question can even be asked with any degree of seriousness.

Barack Obama, alas, looked into Vladimir Putin’s cold, hard eyes and found a man he wants America to depend on.

-Wesley Pruden

I haven’t yet written about Obama receiving the Nobel Peace Prize.  For all of those who say that he doesn’t deserve it, you haven’t been paying attention to his foreign policy.  After all, what better way is there to promote peace than making dramatic concessions to our peaceful allies, the Russians.  A few weeks ago, Obama made the decision to forestall the development of missile defense shields in Poland and the Czech Republic.  It is nice to see Obama snub these warmongering Israel-wannabes, in favor of strengthening our relationship with our peaceful allies, the Russians.  After all, we are going to need their help if we are going to enforce sanctions against Iran for pursuing their peaceful nuclear weapons program.  You would think that with all of the conciliatory overtures that Obama has made towards Russia, that our peaceful friends in Moscow would reverse their position on Iran and promote a peaceful solution.  Which is why when Hillary, our fortuitous Secretary of State, was in Russia this week she came back with this news:

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov restated at a news conference with Clinton Russia’s long-standing position that any talk of sanctions against Iran at this stage was counter-productive.

Counter-productive indeed.  That is if you are referring the to the peaceful interests of our friends, the Russians.  I guess the world would be a pretty peaceful place already, if it wasn’t for those warmongering Israelis who will probably be forced to conduct a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.  Maybe Obama and our friends the Russians hope that Iran can first “wipe the Israel problem off the map,” then nothing can get in the way of all this peacefulness.

Lean on Me

On second thought, Obama certainly deserved the Nobel Prize, but I am a little disappointed that the prize wasn’t a shared one – with Vladimir Putin.  Sure, Obama has done a lot to change the atmospherics of how America is viewed in the world from a country of bellicose, arrogant strength to one of peacefully ignorant weakness.  But Putin, he is the man with the plan.  He is the one exploiting Obama’s peacefulness to change the actual power dynamics on the ground that will result in the next decade being either characterized by peace or conflict.  Given Russia’s long history of exporting peace and Putin’s inherent peacefulness, I am sure the world has a bright and peaceful future in store.  Something for Oslo to consider.