Ambassador's Corner
WEEKLY MESSAGE FROM AMBASSADOR JOHN BRUTON
April 21, 2008
Senator Claire McCaskill
Last week I met Senator Claire McCaskill, the new Democratic Senator for Missouri
who was elected in 2006. Senator McCaskill is Deputy Whip of the Senate
Democrats and a member of the Armed Services, Commerce, Science and
Transportation and Homeland Security Committees of the Senate.
My main purpose in meeting her was to discuss improving the efficiency of
air
travel between Europe and the United States. The EU promotes liberalization and
competition as the best way to deliver efficient and moderately priced air
travel. But this must not be at the expense of safety.
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Senator McCaskill and I discussed how best to ensure the effectiveness of
official inspections of aircraft repair operations to ensure that all our planes
are safe. Both European and American inspection systems aspire to the highest
standards, so there is room for mutual recognition and pooling of our efforts to
maximise safety.
Senator McCaskill also briefed me on her views on the military situation in
Iraq
and on progress towards peace in the
Middle East.
On a lighter note, I told her of my family links with her home state. My great
Grand Uncle, James, emigrated to Missouri in 1856. He subsequently became a
banker, shop owner and farmer in the Missouri town of Festus, where there even
is a lane called after him. There was a family legend in Ireland that he was
successful in selling mules to both sides in the American Civil War, not an
impossibility in that particular part of Missouri! Some of his descendants still
live in the state.
AARP - American Association of Retired Persons
Neither the United States nor Europe will set the agenda for the world 20 years
from now, if we fail to deal with the challenges caused by ageing. Election
campaigns on both sides of the Atlantic unfortunately pay little attention to
these issues.
I was honoured to be invited to speak at a 2-day conference in Washington on
healthcare and
ageing organised by the
AARP last week.
The conference was addressed by experts on health from a number of European
countries including the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Ireland and
Sweden. Notable speakers included the former President of Ireland, Mary
Robinson, and Peter Orszag, the Director of the US Congressional Budget Office.
AARP is a very influential organisation. One in four of the people who actually
vote in US elections are AARP members.
The cost of healthcare, the topic of the conference, has the potential to become
a crippling burden for the United States. Healthcare already absorbs over 16% of
GDP here, as against a share ranging from 7 to 10% of GDP in Europe. But this
large expenditure in the United States is not reflected in a longer life
expectancy, which is in fact less in the US than in Europe.
A shorter life expectancy is influenced by such things as poverty or bad
nutrition during childhood, by tough working conditions during adulthood or by
bad lifestyle, as much as by the availability or non-availability of healthcare
later in life.
David Walker, the Comptroller of the United States, told the AARP Board of
Directors recently that commitments to older people under existing Medicare,
Medicaid and Social Security schemes add up to an exposure of the Federal budget
to costs of $52 trillion, whereas the Federal debt itself only involves an
explicit exposure of $11 trillion!
He said that between 2007 and 2032, while US GDP will grow by 71%, but Medicaid
spending (for those with low incomes) will grow by 224%, and Medicare spending
(for older Americans) by 235%.
It is refreshing and constructive to see an organisation like the AARP, which
represents elderly Americans, seeking to learn from experience in other
countries on how best to contain health costs. Rather than waiting for the
problem to become acute, or adopting an unconstructive approach of objection to
all reform, the AARP is taking the lead in seeking solutions in good time.
Europe can learn a lot from this approach. While Europe does not have quite as
acute a potential healthcare problem as a result of ageing, it has an even more
acute one with pensions.
Visit to New York
Last week I visited New York to give a lecture on the European Union at
Pace
University, to meet with a network of young Irish-born professionals working in
the city [below, top photo: Irish Network] and to meet the American Ireland Fund
[below, middle photo]. At Pace University, I was
introduced by Professor Darren Hayes [above, left of Mr. Bruton], whose cousin Brian is a Member of
Parliament in Ireland, and I met an old friend, Professor John P. McCarthy of
Fordham University [below, bottom photo].
John Duffy, Chair Loretta Brennan Glucksman, Mr. Bruton &
Irish UN Ambassador Kavanagh
A highlight of this visit to New York was a meeting with
Duncan Niederauer, the
new Chief Executive of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) [below]. Mr. Niederauer took
over from John Thain. The EU enjoys a very close and productive relationship
with the NYSE, who have hosted the President of the European Commission,
José
Manuel Barroso. This relationship has been facilitated by Jeff Eubank, head of
governmental affairs in the Exchange and formerly Deputy Chief of Protocol in
the White House.
I discussed mutual recognition of
stock exchanges and investment brokers between
EU and the US with Duncan Niederauer. Mutual recognition would reduce the cost
of raising capital and improve the efficiency of the transatlantic economy.
I also visited New York University to speak at their
Center
for Global Affairs with Dr. Alon Ben Meir [left], Professor of International Relations and
Middle East Studies at the Center. This was an exceptionally interesting
discussion.
Dr. Ben Meir believes that the Arab peace initiative, originally launched in
Beirut in 2002 and reiterated in 2007, offers the best way forward to a
settlement of the Israel/Palestinian dispute. He believes that it would be
easier for Palestinians to move towards compromise with Israel under an Arab
umbrella than under a process originating elsewhere. The Arab initiative, which
is endorsed by all the Arab states in the region, including Syria, creates a
framework under which all Palestinians can unite, and a channel through which
Israel can negotiate with some Palestinian parties, with which it might not wish
to dialogue directly.
Dr. Ben Meir's argument on this subject can be accessed at
www.alonben-meir.com .
Visit of Pope Benedict XVI
Last week I was at the Mass said by Pope Benedict XVI in the new Nationals
Stadium in South West Washington, DC. His message to modern society was understated,
but very clear.
"Freedom is not only a gift, it is also a summons to personal responsibility,"
he said.
The incorporation of the languages of immigrant groups – Spanish, Tagalog, Igbo,
Korean and Vietnamese – in the Liturgy at the Mass emphasised the need to
respect the dignity of immigrants.
My family and I were fortunate to be seated where we were very close to the Pope
as he arrived and departed. We were struck by his physical vigour and by the
intellectual force of the arguments he advanced.
Death penalty
Last week the US Supreme Court upheld lethal injection as a form of execution.
Since September 2007, the Court had suspended executions while it looked at
whether the “three drug regime” used by Kentucky was a violation of the Eighth
Amendment of the US Constitution – which bans cruel or unusual punishments.
The European Union remains opposed to the use of the
death penalty in all
circumstances. The EU is working to establish a global moratorium on the death
penalty as the first step to the elimination of the practice around the world.
The death penalty only survives in, the United States, China, Iran, Iraq, Saudi
Arabia, Yemen, Singapore and Japan.
I strongly urge the governors of all of the US states who have had a moratorium
on executions in place, waiting for the Supreme Court Decision, to maintain the
moratorium.
Although I am very disappointed with the Court’s decision, I take heart from the
statement by Justice John Paul Stevens, who has changed his view on the death
penalty since the 1970s. Last week he said:
“I have relied on my own experience in reaching the conclusion that the
imposition of the death penalty represents ‘the pointless and needless
extinction of life’ with only marginal contributions to any discernible social
or public purposes. A penalty with such negligible returns to the state is
patently excessive and cruel punishment, violative of the Eighth Amendment…”
Please send me your
comments about this or any of my weekly messages or other EU matters. I
look forward to hearing from you!
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