Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett know Iran very well, but knowing a place well does not mean they have any clue how things will end up in Iran. Their op-ed yesterday in the New York Times argues that the size and impact of the Green Movement is vastly overstated and will have little impact on the direction of the Iran.

A few problems with the Leveretts’ attempts to discredit the influence of the Green Movement:

– First of all, by pointing to the number of protesters on Dec. 27 (which they say may have been as few as as few as two to four thousand), they are taking highly conservative assessments at face value. A look at the videos tells a different story, and attacking 20 armed storm troopers doesn’t just happen with a couple thousand people.

– The Leveretts also claim that the pro-regime protests were larger, therefore demonstrating that the regime is much more popular than the Green Movement. Not only does this overlook the fact that the regime encouraged people to attend their protest, but ignores the fact that it takes considerably more courage to attend a protest in which you could actually die or get imprisoned. Regardless, pitting regime-sanctioned photos designed to demonstrate the size of the crowd, against amateur photos taken under duress is not a fair comparison.

The key point here, however, is that for a pro-democracy movement to succeed it does not have to have near unanimous public support, as the Leveretts suggest.

The Leveretts miss similarities between the Green Movement and other past successful pro-democracy movements around the world, instead attempting both in their op-ed and in response to criticism, to discount the Green Movement by showing all the ways in which it is not the same as the 1979 revolution. But saying something isn’t exactly like something else is not really saying anything. Of course no two movements are the same. Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan wrote in their textbook on democratic transitions that there is no set model for democratic transitions (p. 89): “It is well to remember that even the easiest and most successful transition was lived as a precarious process constantly requiring innovative political action.” At the very least this movement has the innovative political action part down.

By trying so hard to discount the movement, come across as politically naive. They write:

Beyond expressing inchoate discontent, what does the current “opposition” want? …Some protesters seem to want expanded personal freedoms and interaction with the rest of the world, but have no comprehensive agenda.

Broad mass-participatory protests movements rarely have a comprehensive agenda. In fact, mass protest movements usually are reactionary in nature. Despite this it seems that the movement is not as inchoate as they claim, as Robin Wright reports in the LA Times the movement now seems to have a manifesto.

Of course, the Leveretts could very well be right about the direction of the movement. The Green Movement may peter out or it may get squashed. But the supreme confidence in which they make this point and their dismissal of what is taking place, denies the obvious dramatic events that have taken place, the remarkable durability of the movement despite months of oppression, and the increasing signs of divisions within the regime itself. It also puts them in opposition to what seems to be the consensus among Iran experts – almost all of whom have struck a cautious tone, saying that what is happening in Iran is dramatic and unprecedented and is a real challenge to the regime, but at the same time noting they have no idea how things will end up.

The Leveretts are correct in saying that US policy toward Iran should be premised on engagement and that the Administration should not bank on the movement bringing down the regime and solving all its problems. However, it would also be a mistake for the Administration to ignore the movement’s existence as the Leveretts are suggesting. Despite their claims, this movement is real. Whether it succeeds or not is another question.

In the hyper-charged atmosphere following the 9/11 attacks, anyone who suggested that U.S. policies or behavior played any — any — part in the spread of extremism was denounced for “blaming America” or “excusing terrorism” or some such. The Terrorists hated us for who we are, we were told, and that was that, and any further attempt to understand the conditions that produced terrorism was strictly for hippies and appeasers.

In the intervening years, though, and especially with the implementation of counterinsurgency strategy in Iraq, that view has been largely discredited. Not only is it no longer seen as “excusing terrorism” to try and understand what activates and motivates extremists, or to explore whether and what U.S. policies and behavior have played a part in that, it’s seen as necessary for U.S. national security.

In the wake of the failed Christmas attack, though, and the discussion over what motivated Umar Farouk Abdulmutalab to become a violent jihadist, a few neoconservatives seem to have been emboldened to exhume some of this “they only hate us for our freedom” nonsense that so many Americans, Iraqis and others died to debunk over the past years. Sounding this tired note last night on Fox News, Charles Krauthammer scoffed at Al Qaeda’s grievances, saying, “These are excuses and not actual grievances”:

KRAUTHAMMER: When you hear Gibbs talk about Guantanamo as a recruiting tool, this is what we hear over and over again, I mean it’s as if he knows no history at all. The list of grievances that Al Qaeda has is endless and replenishing. [...]

The reason the war is on is because Al-Qaeda hates our way of life, our independence, our tolerance, our respect of women and the threat it poses to the fanatical kind of Islam that they are advocating.

Watch it:

Apparently, General David Petraeus is also one of those who Krauthammer thinks “knows no history at all.” Here’s what Petraus said about Gitmo last May:

PETRAEUS: Gitmo has caused us problems, there’s no question about it. I oversee a region in which the existence of Gitmo has indeed been used by the enemy against us. We have not been without missteps or mistakes in our activities since 9/11. And again, Gitmo is a lingering reminder for the use of some in that regard.

It’s really hard to believe that we even still need to have this debate. The point, again, is not whether Charles Krauthammer buys Al Qaeda’s grievances, or whether he thinks that they’re merely “excuses,” it’s whether the next guy that Al Qaeda tries to recruit as a suicide bomber buys them. And it’s simply no longer a matter of serious debate that a significant number of potential recruits buys Guantanamo as a grievance.

Then here’s Hugh Hewitt and Victor Davis Hanson: Read more

A new study by University of California at Los Angeles professor Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda suggests that comprehensive immigration reform, which includes an earned path to legalization for undocumented immigrants, could generate at least $1.5 trillion in added U.S. gross domestic product over 10 years.

Hinojosa bases his findings in a simulation model that uses the effects of legalization under the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) — which granted legal status to 1.7 million undocumented immigrants — as a starting point. IRCA increased the hourly wages of legalized immigrants an average of 15.1 percent by 1992. It also significantly increased incentives for these immigrants to “invest in themselves and their communities” and removed “artificial barriers to upward socioeconomic mobility.” Hinojosa predicts that if comprehensive immigration reform passes in 2010, legalized unauthorized workers would be granted full labor rights, which would in turn boost worker productivity, produce $4.5 to $5.4 billion in new net tax revenue, and generate enough consumer spending to support 750,000 to 900,000 jobs. Taken together, these benefits would add up to a 0.84 percent yearly increase in GDP, or $1.5 trillion over 10 years.

Hinojosa also predicted the effects of an enforcement-only strategy that several right-wing politicians and anti-immigrant activists are advocating for in the place of immigration reform. Hinojosa found that while native-born workers would experience a wage increase, any mass deportation strategy would reduce U.S. GDP by $2.6 trillion over ten years. This number doesn’t take into account the additional $206 to $230 billion it would cost just to physically deport undocumented immigrants over a five-year period.

Some moderate Republicans are more focused on promoting an expansion of temporary immigrant worker programs and have already indicated they won’t support an immigration reform bill that doesn’t include such provisions. Hinojosa warns that if immigration reform were to consist of only a temporary worker program, GDP would only increase by $729 billion over 10 years and result in a wage decline for both native-born and temporary immigrant workers.

Though Hinojosa uses IRCA’s legalization program as the basis of his economic model, he is careful to warn that the bill failed to “create flexible legal limits on immigration that were capable of responding to ups and downs in future U.S. labor demand.” As a result, it was unable to stem the flow of future undocumented immigrants. In response to IRCA’s deficiencies, the nation’s two largest labor federations have already suggested the creation of an independent commission to assess and manage levels of future immigration based on real economic demand.