The Week

National Review, April 7, 2003

-- President Bush pledged to follow the "road map" for Israeli- Palestinian peace that he outlined last June. The plan, developed in concert with Russia, the European Union, and the United Nations, calls on the Palestinians to replace Yasser Arafat and to curb terrorism. Israel would withdraw from Palestinian areas and stop Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. The goal is a democratic Palestinian state, side-by-side with the existing democratic Israeli state. Bush's revival of this plan may provide needed cover to Tony Blair; it will probably not succeed in mollifying Arab opinion (victory will have more impact on that). Will it serve its stated goals? The elements of the plan are sensible, and the Israeli government has endorsed them in theory. But the main roadblock to the road map is the absence of a Palestinian leadership that puts its faith in negotiation rather than terror. If the two parties come to an understanding, well and good. But the experience of the last half-dozen years of muscular diplomacy, cheered on by American exhortation, has shown that the pace cannot be forced. The fate of Israelis and Palestinians is ultimately in their own hands.

-- Donald Rumsfeld has taken some heat in recent weeks for remarks considered undiplomatic. But a few well-chosen words by the defense secretary can go a long way, which is what happened in early March in South Korea. South Koreans had been participating in massive demonstrations against the U.S. presence on the peninsula for months, and the new president rode this anti-American wave into office. Then Rumsfeld hinted that perhaps we should pull some troops out of the South, Kim Jong Il flexed his nuclear muscle, and the anti-American protests went -- poof! South Koreans held a huge pro-American demonstration, and things returned to their usual tense normalcy. As Joseph Conrad wrote, "There is a weird power in a spoken word."

-- Immigrants who naturalize must take an oath of citizenship in which they declare: "I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen." For weeks, Mexican Americans lined up outside Mexican consulates in the United States to renounce this renunciation. They were trying to meet a deadline of March 20, when a Mexican law allowing them to obtain dual nationality expired. Some simply wanted to enjoy improved property rights in their native land, where non-nationals aren't allowed to own land near the coasts or the border. The majority, however, were seeking to reestablish ties for sentimental reasons. There is nothing wrong with such sentiment, but there is something unsettling about this rush to formalize relationships with a foreign government. Our own government so far has chosen to ignore the matter. If Mexico renews its dual-nationality law, we should raise an objection.

-- No country in the world employs the death penalty with more gusto than China. Accurate numbers are hard to come by, but Amnesty International thinks 2,500 executions took place in 2001, with the statistics likely increasing as rising prosperity and increased freedom of movement lead to higher levels of crime. Supporters of capital punishment might cheer China's enthusiasm for the practice were it not that the "crimes" for which people are executed include peaceful political agitation (especially in Tibet and Eastern Turkestan), publishing "state secrets" on the Internet, and attempting to start unauthorized churches. Now, in a drive (literally) for more efficient disposal of enemies of the people, Beijing has rolled out a fleet of mobile execution vans equipped with personnel and apparatus for administering lethal injections. In a test drive on March 6, two drug dealers from Yunnan Province became the first citizens to try out the vans' facilities. These clients, reported the magazine Beijing Today, "benefited from a more humane method of dispatch." Results from the customer-satisfaction surveys are not available.