Europe

The brunt of yesterday's hearing in the House committee about lifting the U.S. travel ban on Cuba came down the following: will allowing American visitors spread word of democracy, or will tourist dollars will just prop up the Castro regime? That is the wrong question according to a a Human Rights Watch report out this week, which documents how the Cuban government uses Orwellian laws to silence dissent and has become more abusive in recent years.

Other governments must also revise their stance towards Cuba with the aim of fomenting human rights, said the report.

Not only have all of these policies -- US, European, Canadian, and Latin American -- failed individually to improve human rights in Cuba, but their divided and even contradictory nature has allowed the Cuban government to evade effective pressure and deflect criticism of its practices."

The report lambasts the United States for allowing Cuba to play David to its Goliath, but it also critiques the ineffective Candian and European policies, and the pedestal/blind eye attitude of Latin American countries, whose silence:

[C]ondones Cuba's abusive behavior, and perpetuates a climate of impunity that allows repression to continue. This is particularly troubling coming from a region in which many countries have learned firsthand the high cost of international indifference to state-sponsored repression."

The ambivalence and outright support for Castro coming from Latin America speaks to the curious distinction people in the region often make between undemocratic regimes of the right and those of the left: those who support the coup in Honduras are the same ones who scream about Castro, whereas those who tolerate Castro are apoplectic about Honduras. 

The idea then, as a European Union official said earlier this month, should not be regime change, but rather human rights. Jorge Castañeda, former Mexican foreign minister, urges a similar policy, calling on the U.S., Europe and Canada to work together. In short: the United States must back down and lift the embargo not only to help Cubans directly, but also to uncouple support of human rights from regime change, thus enabling the strong multilateral approach called for by Human Rights Watch.

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It now seems close to certain that Herman Van Rompuy, the prime minister of Belgium, will be EU president, and Catherine Ashton, currently the EU trade commissioner and the former leader of the British House of Lords, will be foreign-policy czar.

The picks have a symmetry thought necessary in Europe: Rompuy and Ashton are male and female, from a small country and a large one, conservative and liberal.

They are also expected and surprising. Rompuy has for weeks been considered a frontrunner for president. Ashton -- decently known in Britain and on the continent, but barely known elsewhere -- is something of a surprise. The BBC and other outlets report that up until the very end of negotiations, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown pushed for former PM Tony Blair to win the top spot. Germany and other big continental countries advocated for Rompuy, and won; Brown and social-democrats then pushed Ashton through.

Ultimately, Ashton is the more interesting pick. I believe the foreign-policy gig will end up being the vastly more influential one -- Ashton will control thousands of civil servants and a large budget, and will have powers to set policy priorities for the EU. It is unclear just what Rompuy's staffing and responsibilities will be.

But is Ashton qualified enough? Prominent enough? And might any countries object? She has an important job as trade commissioner, but has only been in it for a year. We'll have answers to those questions -- as well as to how transformative these positions might be -- when she and Rompuy take office next month.

Matt Yglesias has some good commentary on the new team and the importance these positions might have, as well as a useful explanation of Ashton's formal title (she is known as Lady Ashton, Baroness of Upholland -- not because she inherited a barony, but because she won an honorific title when she joined the House of Lords). And we'll post any more interesting updates here.

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Today, the way Europe functions as a political bloc might change dramatically. In a matter of hours, we should have official word from Brussels as to the new presient and foreign-policy chief of the European Union: positions hashed out over the course of a decade and finally approved by the passage of the Lisbon Treaty, which might -- just might -- give Europe a much more powerful and unified presence on the international stage.

We'll have the latest, as soon as we hear, here.

At this point, the most-tipped favorite for president is Herman van Rompuy, the prime minister of Belgium. And British papers have already announced Catherine Ashton (the Baroness of Upholland, naturally), a somewhat obscure former leader of the House of Lords and current EU trade commissioner, as foreign-policy chief. 

British ambassador to the United States Sir Nigel Sheinwald usually writes about climate change policy and the difficulties in Afghanistan on his blog, but today he chose to write about bloodsucking vampires.

It seems, as Sheinwald accurately points out, the Brits export a considerable amount of vampires to Hollywood. Robert Pattinson, Stephen Moyer, Kate Beckinsale, Gary Oldman, and Christopher Lee are all British, and all portrayed the undead at some point in their career.

The final paragraph from Sheinwald's piece shows his mastery of the art of pun, although the entire thing is worth reading.

So vampires aside, there is nothing undead about the vibrancy of the UK's cultural and media life. And am I confident of its continued transatlantic success?  The "stakes" may be high, but you may most definitely "Count" on it!   

Today, The Telegraph reported that Herman Van Rompuy, current Prime Minister of Belgium and "the new front-runner to be the first EU President," is looking to institute a European anthem. Van Rompuy could pull ideas from the EU's website, which nobly proclaims its aims as "Peace, prosperity and freedom for its 498 million citizens -- in a fairer, safer world." Or he might look to the Treaty of Lisbon; "Drawing inspiration from the cultural, religious and humanist inheritance of Europe, from which have developed the universal values of the inviolable and inalienable rights of the human person, freedom, democracy, equality and the rule of law." These are the sorts of airy proclamations that are grist for a modern-day anthem.

But Van Rompuy may have to edit some member-states' anthems if he wants harmony across the Union. Germany already moved in the right direction, having dropped the infamous "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles/Über alles in der Welt," a couplet that doesn't quite smack of an all-for-one ethos. 

On the other hand, France's anthem could be confused with Glenn Beck's take on international law, saying, "What! These foreign cohorts! They would make laws in our courts!"

Above all, countries just don't have the taste of peace: "March! March, Dabrowski! March from Italy to Poland!" enjoins the Polish anthem.

"To arms, to arms/On land and sea!" exclaims Portugal.

"Soldiers are we..." begins the Irish anthem. 

"...in our hearts forever we glorify a name/Resounding of battle, the name of gallant Trajan," chant Romanians.

Convincing Europeans to change centuries-old lyrics would require "the best prime minister ever" - luckily for Van Rompuy, the man who fits that bill also loves an excuse to sing.

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A "scurrilous idea" -- better known as the Tobin tax, a levy on foreign-exchange transactions -- seems to be taking on a life of its own.

This week U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio is expected to propose a tax on all financial transactions (like stock purchases -- excluding those connected to health, education, and pensions). The idea of funding job creation in this way has the backing of a variety of groups, including the NAACP, AFL-CIO, and the National Council of La Raza.

Although the idea of a financial transactions tax has been floating around since Nobel economics prize winner James Tobin proposed it in the 1970s (to stabilize currencies), it has gained recent traction since Britain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown brought it up at a meeting of G20 finance ministers meeting earlier this month. He discussed using some form of a tax on all financial transactions, to stabilize whole markets.

Much of the debate focuses on justice, the idea seems to be to tax the bad guys and use the money for any number of just causes. It's hard to argue with that sort of logic. As Brown pointed out, the banks should have to bear some of the costs of the massive bailouts they received.

It cannot be acceptable that the benefits of success in this sector are reaped by the few but the costs of its failure are borne by all of us."

At the request of the G-20, the IMF is preparing a report on the tax -- despite opposition by IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Opponents avoid philosophy and stick to economics, arguing that countries instituting such levies might risk pushing financial operations into friendlier markets and that it would be technically difficult to implement.

In the meantime, Brazil has unilaterally implemented a tax on currency transactions, intended to stabilize the real by reducing speculation.

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Reuters reports that an Italian judge has delayed the resumption of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's tax fraud trial until January, at least. Why? "Pressing state business" -- that is, presiding over a U.N. summit on hunger in Rome.

But Berlusconi has not managed to delay the other criminal case pending against him and is due in court later in November. The magnate/bon vivant/political leader allegedly paid a prominent British lawyer $600,000 to testify falsely on his behalf in a 1997 corruption case. (David Mills, who accepted the bribe, has already been convicted and is currently appealing his jail sentence.)

"Some people get the giggles after using cannabis -- you may laugh at the most random things" cautions "FRANK," the UK's anti-drug website. Despite declining drug use in the country, in January the British government changed marijuana's classification from a "Class C" to a "Class B" drug; possession now carries a maximum penalty of five years imprisonment, while dealing can get you 14 years in jail.

Professor David Nutt, formerly a member of the UK's independent Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, was fired for publicly disputing the decision; five other members of the 31-person Council have since resigned in protest of the politically-motivated firing. In a lecture (later published), Nutt argued that the use of illicit drugs like marijuana and ecstasy poses less severe health risks than the use of alcohol or tobacco. Nutt has also equated the dangers of ecstasy use and the risks of horseback riding.

Nutt's firing and the subsequent resignations have caused quite a political row, with politicians and scientists making pointed attacks on home secretary Alan Johnson, who gave Nutt the axe. "Your leader on drugs policy is long on righteous indignation but short on logic" wrote Johnson in a defensive letter published in The Guardian.

Nutt fired back in a column published in The Telegraph, writing, "Some politicians find it easier to ignore the evidence, and pander to public prejudice instead."

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