MONDAY, DECEMBER 27, 2010 ROBERTJ.SAMUELSON


Our fairness dilemma I


received my Medicare card the


other day, recognizing my 65th birthday and making me part of


one of America’s biggest problems. By this, I mean the burden that the massive baby-boom generation will imposeonits childrenandthenation’s future. There has been much brave talk recently, from Republicans and Democrats alike, about reducing bud- get deficits and controlling govern- ment spending. The trouble is that hardly anyone admits that accom- plishing these goals must include making significant cuts inSocial Secu- rity and Medicare benefits for baby boomers. If we don’t, we will be condemned


to some combination of inferior poli- cies. We can raise taxes sharply over the next 15 or 20 years, roughly 50 percent from recent levels, to cover expanding old-age subsidies andexist- ing government programs. Or we can accept permanently huge budget defi- cits. Even if that doesn’t trigger a financial crisis, it would probably stunt economic growth and living standards. So would dramatically higher taxes. There’s a final choice: deep cuts in other programs, from defense to roads to higher education. Yet, neither political party seems


interested in reducing benefits for baby boomers. Doing so, it’s argued, would be “unfair” to people who had plannedretirementsbasedonexisting programs.Well, yes, itwouldbeunfair. Indeed, it’s hard to imagine a worse time for cuts. Unemployment is hor- rendous; eroding home values and retirement accountshavedepletedthe elderly’s wealth. Only 19 percent of present retirees are “very confident”of having enough money to live “com- fortably,” down from 41 percent in 2007, reports the Employee Benefit Research Institute. But not making cuts would also be


unfair to younger generations and the nation’s future. We have a fairness dilemma: Having avoided these prob- lems for decades, we must now be unfair to someone. To admit this is to demolish the moral case for leaving baby boomers alone. Baby boomers— I’m on the leading edge — and their promised benefits are the problem. If they’re off-limits, the problemis being evaded. Together, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid represent two-fifths of federal spending, double defense’s share. Solutions are clear. Social Security’s


eligibilityages (66nowfor fullbenefits and 62 for reduced benefits) could be gradually raised. Benefits could be cut for wealthier retirees. At 65, new Medicare beneficiaries could pay some or all of their insurance costs until they reached eligibility for full


E.J.DIONNEJR.


Don’t spin the Civil War T


heCivilWar isabout toloomvery large inthepopularmemory.We woulddowell tobe candidabout


its causesandnotallowthedistortions of contemporary politics or long- standing myths to cloud our under- standingofwhy thenationfell apart. Thecomingyearwillmarkthe150th


anniversaryof theonsetof the conflict, whichisusuallydatedtoApril 12, 1861, when Confederate batteries opened fireat4:30a.m.onfederal troopsoccu- pying Fort Sumter. Union forces sur- renderedthenextday,after34hoursof shelling. The CivilWar has forever captured


theAmericanimagination(witnessthe popularity of reenactments) for the gallantry and heroism of those who fought and died, but also for the sheer carnage and destruction it left in its wake. Anniversaries heighten that en- gagement, and I still recall the centen- nial of the war in 1961 as a time when kidswithnoprevious interest inAmer- icanhistorywereexchangingCivilWar trading cards along with baseball cards. My neighborhood friend Jon Udis


got a subscription to Civil War Times Illustrated, and our regular discus- sions of sports heroes Bill Russell, Johnny Unitas and Carl Yastrzemski were briefly interrupted by talk about Grant and Lee, Sherman and “Stone- wall” Jackson. But our conversations, like somany


about the war, focused on people and battles, not on why the confrontation happened in the first place. There re- mains enormous denial over the fact that the central cause of the war was our national disagreement about race and slavery, not states’ rights or any- thing else. Whenthewar started, leaders of the


Southern rebellion were entirely straightforward about this. OnMarch 21, 1861, Alexander Stephens, the Con- federacy’s vice president, gave what came to be known as the “Cornerstone speech” in which he declared that the “proper statusof theNegroinour form of civilization” was “the immediate causeof the late rupture.” Thomas Jefferson, Stephens said,


had been wrong in believing “that the enslavement of the Africanwas in vio- lationof the lawsofnature.” “Our new government is founded


upon exactly the opposite idea,” Ste- phens insisted. “Its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that theNegro is not equal


FREDHIATT


Social Security benefits. Even then, better-off recipients could pay higher premiums. These and other changes shouldstart soon—inafewyearsonce the recovery strengthens. Confession: I’ve written columns


like this for years. Little has changed. Medicare premiums for wealthier re- cipients (income thresholds: $85,000 for individuals, $170,000 for couples) have increased modestly, affecting about 5 percent of beneficiaries. But politicians fear making major chang- es. They dread an assault from AARP, themain senior lobby, and the rage of millions of retirees and near-retirees. Public opinion is hostile. It’s high on reducing deficits and lowon changing the programs that create the deficits. In a recent Pew poll, 58 percent of respondents opposed higher Social Security eligibility ages and64percent rejected higherMedicare premiums. As a society, we’ve recoiled from a


candid discussion of public and pri- vate responsibilities for retirement. The long-ducked question is how much government should subsidize Americans for the last 20to 30years of their lives. Social Security and Medi- care have evolved from an old-age safety net into a “middle-age retire- ment system,” as Eugene Steuerle of the Urban Institute puts it. In 1940, couples reaching 65 lived an average of almost 19 years, Steuerle notes. Now, the comparable figure for cou- ples is 25 years. For Americans born today, the estimate approaches 30 years. Overhauling Social Security and


Medicare has many purposes: to ex- tend people’s working lives; to make them pay more of the costs of their own retirement, as opposed to relying onsubsidies fromyoungerAmericans; to prevent spending on old-age wel- fare fromcrippling other government programs or the economy; to create a bigger constituency for cost control in health care. America’s leaders have tiptoed around these issues, talking blandly about limiting “entitlements” ormakingproposalsof suchcomplexi- ty that only a few “experts” under- stand. Just because this is an awful time to


discuss these questionsdoesnotmean they shouldn’t be discussed. The lon- ger we wait, the more acute our fairness dilemma grows.We can’t deal with it unless public opinion is en- gaged and changed, but public opin- ion won’t be engaged and changed unless political leaders discard their self-serving hypocrisies. The old de- serve dignity, but the young deserve hope. The passive acceptance of the status quo is the path of least resis- tance — and a formula for national decline.


Kitchen culture wars How did fighting obesity become a partisan issue?


puppetrecentlyvisitedtheWhiteHouseto support “Let’s Move,” first lady Michelle Obama’scampaignagainstchildhoodobe- sity. And that campaign has become, in oneof themorestrikingpolitical storiesof thepastyear, thelatestbattlegroundinthe left-right culturewars. It’s never easy


I


for the spouse of a president, who so far has always been a wife, to set- tle on a signature issue. Choose something trivial, and she’ll be ac- cused of frothiness unworthy


of


strong and inde- pendent woman- hood. Choose something more controversial, and people immediate- ly demand, “Who electedyou?” In that context,


thefirst lady’scam- paign would seem to have struckGol- dilocks perfection. The obesity epi- demic is a genuine public health emergency,with vast implications for the nation’s well-being, economy and even national security. And yet, could anyone really be against children eating healthier food and getting more exercise? Could anyone reallyobject toWhiteHouse assis- tant chefSamKass tryingtointerestElmo ina vegetable-ladenburrito? Well, yes, if Michelle Obama is for it,


WHITEHOUSE.GOV


WhiteHouse assistant chef Sam Kass talks to Elmo in a video about healthy food in schools.


someone will be against it. Someone like Glenn Beck, for example,whowasmoved torail against carrot sticks,orSarahPalin, whowarnedthatObamawants todeprive us allofdessert. And when you look a little deeper, it’s


not surprising that a crusade seemingly beyondquestioningwouldbecomeapolit- icalbattle. Interests thatmight feel threat- ened by Let’s Move include the fast-food industry, agribusiness, soft-drink manu- facturers, real estate developers (because suburban sprawl is implicated), broad- casters and their advertisers (of sugary cereals and the like), and the oil-and-gas and automotive sectors (because people ought towalkmore anddrive less). Throw in connections to the health-


care debate (because preventive services will be key to controlling the epidemic), race (because of differential patterns of obesity)andredstate-bluestatehostilities (the reddest states tend to be the fattest), and it turns out there are few landmines thatMichelleObama didn’t trip by asking us all tosheda fewpounds. Insinuations from her critics notwith-


to thewhiteman; that slavery subordi- nation to the superior race is his natu- ral and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical andmor- al truth.” Our greatest contemporary histori-


an of the CivilWar, JamesMcPherson, has noted that Confederate President Jefferson Davis, a major slaveholder, “justified secession in 1861 as an act of self-defense against the incoming Lin- coln administration.” Abraham Lin- coln’s policy of excluding slavery from the territories,Davis said,wouldmake “property in slaves so insecure as to be comparatively worthless . . . thereby annihilating in effect property worth thousandsofmillionsofdollars.” South Carolina’s 1860 declaration


on the cause of secession mentioned slavery, slavesor slaveholding18times. And as the historian Douglas Egerton points out in “Year of Meteors,” his superb recent book on how the 1860 election precipitated the CivilWar, the South split the Democratic Party and later the country not in the name of states’ rights but because it sought federal government guarantees that slavery would prevail in new states. “Slaveholders,” Egerton notes, “rou- tinely shifted their ideological ground inthenameofprotectingunfreelabor.” After the war, in one of the great


efforts of spin control in our history, bothDavis and Stephens, despite their own words, insisted that the war was not about slavery after all but about state sovereignty. By then, of course, slavery was “a dead and discredited institution,” McPherson wrote, and to “concede that the Confederacy had broken up the United States and launched a war that killed 620,000 Americans in a vain attempt to keep 4 million people in slavery would not conferhonorontheir lost cause.” Why does getting the story right


matter?AsMississippiGov.HaleyBar- bour’s recentdifficultywiththehistory of the civil rights years demonstrates, there is to thisday toomuchevasionof how integral race, racism and racial conflict are to our national story. We can take pride in our struggles to over- come the legacies of slavery and segre- gation.Butwe shouldnot sanitizehow contested and bloody the road to jus- ticehasbeen.WewilldishonortheCivil War ifwerefusetofaceuptothereason itwas fought.


ejdionne@washpost.com


standing,Obamahasnotendorsednanny- state or controversial remedies such as ending sugar subsidies, imposing soda- pop taxes or zoning McDonald’s out of certain neighborhoods. Instead, she is pushing for positive, voluntary change:


RIGHT TURN


Excerpts fromJenniferRubin’s commentary on politics and policy: voices.washingtonpost.com/right-turn


HSBC’s shift onits Iranad


The international bank HSBC says it is


pulling an ad that juxtaposes a plug for the bank’s ability to find “potential inunexpected places”with a factoid about Iran: “Only 4%of American films aremade by women. In Iran it’s25%.” The implication that Iranian women —


who are tortured, imprisoned and evenmur- deredforexercisingrightsof freespeech—are better situated than their American counter- parts is simply preposterous. In response to my inquiry, HSBC spokesman Robert Sher- man denied that the ad suggested the bank was exploring investment opportunities in Iran. As for the comparison of female filmmak-


ers in Iran and the United States, Sherman said: “HSBC offers no opinion on the lives of artists inany country.This isnot a topic that’s germane to anadcampaignfor a global bank. Theadneedstobeconsideredinthecontextof our ‘Unlocking the World’s Potential’ cam- paign. As with our prior ‘Values’ campaign, this campaign intentionally makes no judg- ment.The intent isonly toemphasize surpris- ing facts based on geographic diversity, as a way to facilitate a conversation about the world’s potential. Other surprising facts fea- tured in this campaign: Holland earns more exporting soy than Japan; USA has more Spanish language newspaper readers than LatinAmerica.” A“surprisingfact”not intheadbut report-


ed by The Post lastweek: “Prominent Iranian director Jafar Panahi was sentenced to six years in prison and banned from making films, writing scripts, giving interviews and traveling abroad for the coming 20 years, his lawyer saidTuesday.” The State Department’s human rights re-


port on Iran published inMarch noted that: “[T]he government effectively censored do- mestic filmmaking. Producers were required tosubmitscriptsandfilmproposalstogovern- ment officials in advance of funding approval . . . and some domestic directors were black- listed.” A day after I contacted HSBC, Sherman


followed up with an e-mail saying: “The ad was meant to encourage debate and discus- sion, andwe certainly did not intend to cause offense. Subsequent to hearing some recent concerns, we are removing the ad from our global campaign.” As to HSBC’s Iran operations, the bank


contends: “HSBC’s Iran policy remains the same: no newdeals, no activity not permitted under existingsanctions.” ItisnotclearpreciselywhatbusinessHSBC


continues to conduct in Iran. Securities and Exchange Commission filings show that the bankmaintains an office there. HSBC scaled back some of its business there in 2007, in response to growing concern about Iran’s ac- tivities. Of late, HSBC’s practices have drawn attention from regulators. The bank is being probedbytheU.S.JusticeDepartmentandthe U.S. Attorney’s Office. It has hired Deloitte to examine transactions related to a money- laundering investigation.AndtheFederalRe- serve Bank of Chicago and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency issued a “cease and desist” order to HSBC’s North American unit in October, having found that there was “significant potential” the bankwas conduct- ing transactions on behalf of sanctioned enti- ties.TwomembersofCongresshavewrittento FederalReserveChairmanBenBernankeurg- ing stronger controls on bank activity in Iran, citingHSBCasanexample. WhenStuartLevey, theTreasuryundersec-


retary in charge of financial sanctions, testi- fiedbefore theHouseForeignAffairs commit- teethismonth,hedetailedlaboriousefforts to exposeIranianbanksandcompaniesinvolved inillicitactivitiesandtopersuadebanksinthe United States and Europe to cease activities thatmight facilitate Iran’snuclear or terrorist activities. Levey explained in part: “The vast bodyofpublicinformationdemonstratingthe scope of Iran’s illicit conduct and deceptive practices—practices that have facilitated its proliferation activities—makes it nearly im- possible for financial institutions andgovern- ments to assure themselves that transactions with Iran could not contribute to prolifera- tion-sensitiveactivity.” HSBC says it doesn’t make “value judg-


ments.”Butby continuing todobusinesswith amurderous regime, the bank shows its cor- porate values.


bledinthepast30years, from15percent to 34 percent (with another 34 percent over- weight); the share of obese children and teenagers more than tripled, from 5 per- cent to 17 percent. In fact, the astonishing acceleration of the epidemic (which may nowhave leveled off)might explain some of the skepticism; it takes a while for awareness tocatchuptostatistics. But the statisticsare scary.The implica-


tions for thesechildrenareheartbreaking, literally (obesity is associatedwith higher incidenceofheartdiseaseaswellasdiabe- tes) and figuratively. For the nation, it could be bankrupting. Obesity and its attendant ills alreadymay add asmuch as $147 billiontohealth-care costseachyear, one-tenth of the nation’s medical bill, a figure that is certainto rise.AndtheArmy reportsthatoneinfouryoungpeopleistoo fat toserve. That’s why obesity is not a Democratic


or Republican issue. Obama has merely extended and amplified a campaign that began under President George W. Bush; Bush’s last acting surgeon general, Steven K.Galson,made obesity a signature issue, callingit “anationalhealthcrisis . . . [that] is driving up healthcare costs and crip- pling the fabricofour communities.” The crisis won’t be solved in one presi-


dential term, either. “We’re talking about changing habits that have been formed over generations,”Obamahas said. You’ll notice, if you watch the White


Housevideo, thatElmoneveractuallyeats that red-pepper burrito, though he claims tobeenticed.“Where’sthesourcream?”he may be thinking. “Andnomeltedcheese?” “It’s not going to be easy,” Michelle


Obama says.She’s right—but alsoright to keeppushing.


s Elmo a Kenyan, too? Or maybe a Socialist?He is awfully red, after all. I ask because the Sesame Street


more recess and physical activity, more playgrounds, more vegetable gardens, fresher foodinschools andgrocery stores, better education on the issue for parents andchildren. Allof thismakestotalsense,andhistori-


ans will marvel (much as they will at climate-change deniers) that anyone could doubt it. The percentage of Ameri- can adultswho are obesemore than dou-


KLMNO


K EZ RE


A15


Egypt’s real state of emergency


BYMOHAMEDELBARADEI E


gypt has recently held yet another fraudulent and farcical election. Ballot boxes were stuffed. Votes


were bought. People who considered vot- ing for the opposition were subjected to violence by professional thugs. And these transgressions have beenwell document- ed by humanrights groups. Democracy must mean more than


merely going through themotions. In theory, Egypt has a constitution and


laws that reflect thewill of its people. But inreality, theprovisionsareahodgepodge thatperpetuates theirongripof theruling regime. President HosniMubarak enjoys imperial powers. There is no legislative oversight of themilitary budget.Nomore than five people are permitted to assem- blewithoutpermissiontostageapeaceful demonstration.Universitieshavesecurity forces on campus to ensure that students donot engage inpolitical activities. A recent constitutional amendment


has made it almost impossible for an independent actor to run for president. Any candidatewho is not amember of an officially sanctioned party is forbidden to have a headquarters or to raise funds. Political activists are often blocked from renting venues for meetings. In the 12 months since I began campaigning for reforminEgypt, I have received a flood of requests for interviews, but after the re- cent crackdown on themedia hardly any local TV stations have dared to express interest intalking tome. In theory, Egypt has multiple political


parties. In practice, establishing such a partyrequirespermissionfromacommit- tee dominated by theNationalDemocrat- ic Party (NDP) — the political machine that has kept Mubarak in power since 1981.Andanynewpartymustexist for five years before it can field a presidential candidate.


Egypt’s pseudo-stability based on repression is a ticking bomb dangerously close to exploding.


In theory, Egypt has an elected presi-


dent. But over the past half-century, the country has had only three rulers. There were differences in their style and vision, but all have presided over an authoritari- anandrepressivepolitical system.For the past29years,Egyptiansocietyhasexisted under a draconian “state of emergency,” a tool that has allowed the president to suspend basic constitutional protections and that has been used to detain, torture and sometimes kill those who dare to dissent. In theory, Egypt has a democratically


elected parliament. In practice, one-third of the members of its upper house are appointed by the president. Of the 508 seats, 440 are held by members of the NDP. InnowayistheEgyptianparliament representative of the Egyptian people. Although about 10 percent of Egyptians areCopticChristians, theCopts hold only 3 seats in parliament. TheMuslimBroth- erhood, a religious movement that man- aged to win 20 percent of the seats in the 2005 parliamentary elections, was shut out of the November elections and now holds no seats. The Wafd, the largest liberalparty,wonsixseats.Bothboycotted the run-off votebecause of the substantial fraudcommittedanddocumentedduring the first-round voting lastmonth. In theory, Egypt has a court system; in


fact, legal decisions are often ignored when they run contrary to government policy. Egypt’s economic andsocial fabric con-


tinues to deterioriate. Despite annual growthingrossdomesticproductof 5 to6 percent the past fewyears, there has been little to no trickle-down effect. The ob- scene gap between rich and poorworsens daily. The middle class has all but disap- peared. More than 40 percent of Egyp- tians live on less than $2 per day. Nearly 30 percent are illiterate—a sad commen- tary for the culture that,more than 2,000 years ago, gave the world the Library of Alexandria. In Cairo, amega-city ofmore than 15 million, half the population lives in shantytowns next to gated communi- ties that rival the opulence in Southern California. Egypt urgently needs a newbeginning.


The voices of dissent are growing in num- ber. We come from many orientations, from different vocations, from different parts of society, fromdifferent faiths. But we speak with a single voice in seeking social justice.We demand an accountable and transparent system of government, withmeaningful checks andbalances.We want economic opportunity for all Egyp- tians and the right to live in dignity and freedom. Together we are organizing aroundpeaceful change.The internation- al community ought to support our strug- gle for freedom and hold Egypt to its international commitments with respect to human rights. The rights of the Egyp- tian people should not be trampled in exchange for anelusivepromiseof stabili- ty.


The present pseudo-stability based on


repression is a ticking bomb that is dan- gerously close to exploding. Lasting sta- bility inEgypt, as in any nation,will come only through genuine democracy that responds fairly to the needs and aspira- tions of all its people.


Thewriter, a former director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency,was the 2005winner of theNobel Peace Prize.


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