Today, H.R. McMaster reminds Americans that civic holidays such as Independence Day offer citizens the opportunity to come together in communities to respectfully consider shared challenges; Peter Berkowitz seeks to sharpen the aims of higher education reform proponents by reflecting on the foundational goals of liberal education; and Joshua Rauh, Benjamin Jaros, and Daniel Heil propose remedies for congressional budget scorekeeping that would enhance public trust in the forecasted impacts of federal budgets.
Revitalizing American Institutions
Writing at RealClearPolitics, Senior Fellow H.R. McMaster argues that “the celebration of Independence Day is an opportunity to reinforce our common identity as Americans, recognize that U.S. engagement abroad advances security at home, and restore faith in our ability to work together to build a better future.” At a time when Americans have more opportunities for long-distance connection and community building than ever before, McMaster notes, we are more “distant from one another socially, psychologically, emotionally, and spiritually.” The retired Army lieutenant general suggests that holiday gatherings like July 4 barbeques provide excellent opportunities to practice civil exchange across political divisions and to recommit ourselves to teaching history to America’s youth. He closes by remembering the wisdom of Rosa Parks, who said, “We will fail when we fail to try.” Read more here.
In his weekly column for RealClearPolitics, Senior Fellow Peter Berkowitz uses the ideas expressed in a recent New York Times podcast to launch a critique of the arguments and aims of higher-education reform advocates. Berkowitz stresses that bringing more conservative students and faculty to elite campuses is not just a matter of “viewpoint diversity” but is rather a necessary remedy to counteract “progressives’ dogmatic slumber,” foster “toleration by creating a community in which left and right share a way of life,” and spur “both [right and left] to recognize their opinions’ limitations and the other side’s insights.” Zooming out to consider the higher-ed reform movement’s broader requirements, the longtime professor maintains, “We need reformers who can explain that liberal education aims to form cultivated human beings capable of exercising wisely the rights and discharging effectively the responsibilities of free citizens.” Read more here.
Answering Challenges to Advanced Economies
“The debate surrounding the ‘One Big, Beautiful Bill’ revealed deep concerns regarding how Congress’s scorekeeping agencies—the Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT)—arrive at their official estimates of the budgetary effects of proposed legislation,” write Senior Fellow Joshua Rauh, Research Fellow Benjamin Jaros, and Policy Fellow Daniel Heil in piece for their Substack series “Checking the Scorekeepers.” The scholars focus on how the JCT scores tax legislation and highlight how greater transparency, particularly into the construction of the JCT’s conventional model, is essential to restoring confidence in scoring before the next tax debate. Although there will be challenges—not least, “JCT’s reliance on a model built on a 70-year-old programming language”—the piece makes the case that “improving trust in scorekeepers is vital in ensuring a credible budget process.” Read more here.
Innovation and Higher Education
In a piece for The Times (UK), Senior Fellow Niall Ferguson considers the future of liberal education in an era marked by the rapid progress and adoption of artificial intelligence. After surveying how AI technology is poised to transform the labor force and the nature of geopolitical competition, Ferguson offers thoughts on how universities can best adapt their curricula for student success in an increasingly automated world. He suggest that students should be asked to spend about seven hours per day operating with the “traditional methods of learning,” such as reading printed books, discussing texts with peers and instructors, and “writing essays and problem-sets with pen and paper.” The goal of such requirements, according to Ferguson, is to produces students able to rigorously think for themselves, and thus able to make the wisest use of powerful large language models and other innovative research tools. Read more here.
US Foreign Policy in the Middle East
In an essay for his Substack, Michael McFaul assesses the possible longer-term impacts of President Trump’s recent decision to bomb Iran’s fortified nuclear infrastructure. McFaul emphasizes that on a military level, the attack was well executed and sent “a powerful signal to our adversaries of our extraordinary military capabilities,” providing “a good outcome for American national security interests.” Still, McFaul notes that the success of the strike’s political objectives—namely, the end of the Iranian nuclear program—is “harder to judge today.” McFaul’s larger concern is how the US acted unilaterally, “without the United States being immediately threatened.” He argues that Trump and his national security team “could have persuaded more Americans and members of Congress about the necessity of using force” by sharing additional declassified intelligence showing Iran’s closeness to gaining nuclear weapons. Read more here.
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