Then what?

ILLUSTRATED: Some preliminary answers to some questions for over the horizon.

Joe Biden likes to ask “then what?” regarding those who advocate an immediate, complete pullout from Iraq. There are several issues coming up on the horizon for which there will be excruciating moral dilemmas. As we have learned in the last six years, empty bumper sticker statements without asking “Then what?” leads to disaster. The problem is that I have not been hearing answers to them from our party’s leaders. So here’s a stab at them:

Genetic Privacy- I was told that by the end of the next president’s first term, we will be able to buy our genetic maps for $1,000. If insurance companies (and employers) got their hands on that, it would be like a card dealer who can peek at cards before deciding to deal them. But we do want doctors and researchers to know, usually, what we are vulnerable to in order to treat us. Scientific breakthroughs will shift ethical frames, and we need a major conversation on the implications of this.

Cap-Auction-Trade- With carbon emissions, we have to do this. Namely, cap emissions nationally, auction the right to pollute and use the money for alternative energy R&D. The right to pollute must then be tradable. But like with globalized commerce, there will be major dislocations in smokestack industries. Not unlike candlemakers at the dawn of the electric age, and railroads with the dawn of the automobile. The solution here is federal support for lifetime education and a national, portable healthcare risk pool.

Globalization- Trade deals are ripping apart both parties right now. Globalization will go on, the politicians can only regulate how quickly it happens. Same answer as above, education and health insurance.

Domestic intelligence- I’m calling for more police cooperation with the FBI, and today’s arrest of a terrorist plot at JFK is more evidence that local law enforcement must be integrated with the national intelligence community. There will be civil liberties violations, and the way to control that is to have state governments manage the analysis of intelligence as well as monitor the investigations. While intelligence gathering must be brought down to the local level, it must be controlled at a higher level.

Iraq pullout- I met a senior Senate Democrat (not Biden) this week. He told the group I was in that we must look into a possible future with a regional war on the Persian Gulf Region and ask if the current occupation under Bush is the lesser evil. Colin Powell told GWB that if we break it, we own it. There is a moral component to consider as well as the likelihood of having to return in future years. This is not a sustainable situation currently, and the Iraqi people must civilly come together.

The oil distribution must be settled before we leave. Currently, half is on the black market. Even after that is settled, I predict 50,000 American troops in the region by November, 2012.