Selective sacrifice

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NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s the World and Everything in It from World Radio, celebrating 15 years.

Today is October 14th. Thank you for making us part of your morning routine.

Good morning. I’m Nick Eicher.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

It’s Washington Wednesday, time for our weekly conversation on politics and government.

Joining us is Hunter Baker, political scientist and senior fellow at the First Liberty Institute.

Hunter, good morning.

HUNTER BAKER: Good morning.

EICHER: Well, Hunter, issue one: counting the cost of foreign policy. Hunter, here’s something I find striking about American foreign policy priorities: the war with Iran has driven fuel prices sharply higher. We know this. Polling suggests, and we know this too, Americans have little time for that economic pain, even with the objective of preventing a nuclear-armed Iran.

Meantime, President Trump has now moved to ease sanctions on Russian diesel fuel, hoping to bring prices down here at home, as it is a global commodity, the economic chain is pretty obvious. Higher diesel means higher farming costs, higher transportation costs, higher construction costs, and that plays its way through the economy. Diesel fuel is crucial. In any event, all of this has brought fierce objections.

Critics say the U.S. should not ease economic pressure on Vladimir Putin, at the same time that Russia continues to attack Ukraine. So here’s what’s fascinating to me: We’re told that Americans will not tolerate higher fuel prices to stop a nuclear Iran, but we’re also told that Americans should tolerate higher prices to maintain pressure on Russia over Ukraine.

So, why is the economic sacrifice treated so differently in these two cases, Hunter? What does it tell us about our foreign policy priorities?

BAKER: I suspect that it may have something to do with how theoretical a threat feels. I think that probably for a lot of Americans, the idea of a nuclear Iran doesn’t feel like an immediate threat, but what I would say is that if they do get a nuclear weapon, of course they would immediately be thinking about Israel.

But I think that Israel is sort of the small Satan for Iran, and I think that the United States is the big Satan, and I think that we would have to be concerned as well. And given the stupendous terrorism that the United States has experienced within this quarter century, that is something that we have to be concerned about with regard to Russia and Ukraine.

That conflict, I think, has a little bit more of a human face to it. It was sort of obvious how Russia was a an invader and a transgressor, and Zelensky has been sort of a sympathetic figure pleading the cause of his country.

BROWN: Well, let’s look at the practical consequences, Hunter. How much leverage over Putin does the United States actually surrender by allowing Russian diesel into the global market?

BAKER: I’m not sure how much we have really been able to hurt Putin.

I’m sure that there’s a strong case that could be made, but I remember when the conflict began, hearing one of the Brookings Institution scholars talking about the measures the United States would take and that they would be so extreme and so effective that Russia would cease having an effective economy, a functioning economy, a modern economy within a fairly short period of time, that has not occurred.

China has stepped in and has really backstopped Russia. Has been there to purchase as much oil and gas as Russia wants to sell, and so I’m not sure that we’re giving up that much leverage here or helping Russia that much by taking on diesel.

EICHER: There was an interesting argument by Walter Russell Mead writing in the Wall Street Journal. He sees the president trying to accommodate competing instincts within his own coalition, hawkish toward Iran, but more inclined toward accommodation with Russia.

BROWN: So, Hunter, can those instincts coexist within a coherent foreign policy, or does the president eventually have to make a choice that disappoints one side of his coalition?

BAKER: First of all, I think that one of the major ways that Donald Trump appealed to the American electorate was to present himself as a non-interventionist figure in terms of foreign policy. The idea was going to be that we were going to be strong, and maybe we would make demands, but we were not going to be sending troops over. We were not going to be spending a lot of money on these sort of foreign adventures.

We have ended up having to do that, and so I think that a lot of Americans, with regard to both Iran and the Ukraine Russia situation, have been saying to themselves, "How have we gotten back into this situation again, despite having a president who really expressed the desire not to be in these sorts of situations, so that selling of himself and where we are right now seems incoherent I think to a lot of American voters. With regard to disappointing one side of the coalition.

Certainly, there has been a group within the Republican or conservative coalition that has been more sympathetic to Putin than you might expect, and I think that part of that is that there are some Republicans who see Putin as a heroic figure who is resisting sort of a woke kind of influence in foreign affairs that he is resisting the predominance of maybe kind of some people call it quote global homo type movement and so there are people who like him for that reason.

BROWN: Okay, moving on issue two: Guilfoyle and the price of excess. President Trump has pushed out his ambassador to Greece, Kimberly Guilfoyle. The Wall Street Journal reported that she solicited $100,000 from a political donor to pay her credit card bill. Further reporting raised questions about financial benefits from wealthy businessmen.

EICHER: Well, even to this day, Guilfoyle denies any wrongdoing, but Trump says he didn’t like what he was reading in the newspaper. Just to be completely honest, the White House did ask her to resign. They acknowledged that, and she did. So, Hunter, the president has acted against a longtime political ally.

Do you think this is an example of accountability working as it ought to, or does the episode kind of expose a deeper problem with rewarding political loyalty through diplomatic appointments like this?

BAKER: I think it shows bad judgment on the president’s part—

EICHER: Which? Letting her go or putting her in there in the first place:

BAKER: Putting her in in the first place, he is known to like people who have been on TV and who he thinks looks good on TV, and certainly she had that reputation and certainly earlier in her career. You might think of somebody as Pete Hegseth in the same way somebody who’s been on television and then puts into a position in the administration. These sorts of appointments, especially diplomatic appointments, are often done because of relationships or campaign donations or things of that nature. That has often affected those sorts of things, but she really broke the rules.

One of the things that comes through in political ethics, and I know that sounds like an oxymoron, right? Political ethics, kind of.

But but one of the things that that is is there is that people who are in office need to not only avoid impropriety, but even the appearance of impropriety, and it is clear that in this example, where she appears to be directly soliciting money in exchange for political access or something like that, we have gone way beyond the appearance of impropriety in such a way that we would damage the confidence of American citizens, and so I really think that the president had to act.

And it does not help that she was Don Jr. former paramour or girlfriend,

EICHER: Fiancée.

BAKER: Okay, even better, right? Fiancée, and this looks like a way for him to transition a bad relationship out of the country.

EICHER: All right. Well, issue three: Rubio and the inheritance of the West. Let’s stay in Greece, but turn to a very different story. There, Secretary of State Marco Rubio delivered a sweeping address in Athens last week. He drew a line from ancient Greek civilization through Rome, Christianity, and the founding of America.

BROWN: Yeah, he described a Western inheritance rooted in natural law, truth, beauty, and the pursuit of excellence, and he argued that Western nations must recover the confidence to defend their civilization without surrendering their sovereignty. It was an unusually philosophical address for a Secretary of State, and its argument went well beyond the immediate crisis confronting the administration.

EICHER: Hunter, Rubio seems to be offering in that speech more than an America First foreign policy. He’s describing a distinctly Western understanding of human nature. Nature and political purpose. Do you see this as a serious attempt to give the administration a governing philosophy, and how well does that philosophy fit with the policies that we’re actually seeing? Maybe there’s another possibility.

Maybe he’s setting himself up to run for president. You tell me.

BAKER: Certainly, it was a presidential type of address. What I think about is one of Russell Kirk’s books. Most people think of him for the Conservative Mind.

I really like the Roots of American Order, where he traces out the cities that lead you to America, and those cities are Athens, Rome, Jerusalem, and London, and so here you have Rubio focusing on Athens as part of that line that leads you toward the apex of civilization at which I think he’s trying to say America sits, and he wants America to continue to sit at that apex and to not just become one of those historical cities where we say, "Hey, Philadelphia or New York or Washington D.C. is an inspiration to the future, but continues to be a dominant influence in society.

So he’s really trying to give Americans a dream, something to strive for, not to fade back into something like European welfareism or safetyism, but instead to be something like a civilizational leader, a holder of the civilization project.

BROWN: Okay, Hunter, let’s finish with our lightning round. Federal agents have searched Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar’s home under a court-authorized warrant. The investigation reportedly involves immigration matters, but the government has released little about the underlying evidence. Omar calls it political intimidation.

EICHER: Question: Should the Justice Department apply a higher threshold before taking such a public investigative step against a sitting member of Congress, particularly just three weeks out from Election Day.

BAKER: The last thing you said is the most important. My understanding is that there has traditionally been sort of an informal rule that nothing like this is going to happen 60 days before an election, if that is the case, then obviously this violates that rule. And if it turns out that this is attention getting, but there’s nothing there, it’s going to look bad. It’s going to look like an attempt to manipulate the political process.

BROWN: Next up, the Pentagon plans to livestream the December execution of Nidal Hasan, the convicted Fort Hood murderer. The firing squad is one question. Broadcasting it to the world is another. Hunter, should the government ever turn an execution into a public broadcast?

BAKER: I do not have the instinctive revulsion to this that I think that a lot of people do. I think that if it was done in a dignified manner, then it could help to vindicate justice and to serve as a warning to those who would commit similar atrocities.

BROWN: And finally, prediction markets have moved into strange new territory, betting on criminal trials. People can now wager on the outcomes of court cases, raising concerns about juror influence and the integrity of proceedings.

EICHER: All right, and this one, as we close, is a yes or no. Do you think Congress ought to make betting on criminal jury verdicts around the country illegal?

BAKER: It absolutely should be prohibited. I don’t even think it’s a close question. We’re already concerned about all the different ways that sporting matches can be manipulated in order to make bets pay off. It’s completely unacceptable the idea that anything like that could ever affect a criminal proceeding.

BROWN: Hunter Baker is a political scientist and senior fellow at the First Liberty Institute. Hunter, thanks as always. Thank you.

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