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America’s Gridlock Is Beijing’s Best Argument
Nov 12, 2026
Americans tend to treat democracy’s superiority as settled, and the long-run evidence backs them up. A major study by MIT economist Daron Acemoglu and colleagues found that countries that democratize end up about 20 percent richer per person within a generation. But most of the world does not grade governments on long-run studies. For billions of people outside the wealthy West, the test is simpler: does the power stay on, are food prices steady, is there work, and do the roads get built? When the stomach is empty, a ballot can feel like a luxury.
China understands this and sells its model on exactly those terms. Its GDP per capita has climbed from about $300 in 1980 to nearly $15,000 today, by IMF figures, and the World Bank credits it with lifting some 800 million people out of extreme poverty. India, the world’s largest democracy, started from a similar place and sits near $2,800. Beijing’s centralized system, paired with Deng Xiaoping’s market reforms, built power plants, factories and rail lines at a pace India’s more deliberative politics has not matched. Anyone who values liberty will find little to admire in that model. It does explain why the model sells.
Prosperity Usually Comes First
Political science has a blunt finding here. Adam Przeworski and Fernando Limongi found that no democracy had ever collapsed in a country richer than Argentina was in 1975, about $6,000 per head in 1985 dollars, while poorer democracies fell again and again. South Korea and Taiwan industrialized under authoritarian rule and became durable democracies once they grew rich. Singapore took a hybrid road under Lee Kuan Yew, pairing disciplined execution with tight limits on political freedom; its GDP per capita now tops $100,000.
Silencing people is the wrong takeaway. Regimes that crush dissent blind themselves to their own mistakes. The lesson is about the order of needs. A factory worker in Shenzhen or a farmer in Uttar Pradesh wants a reliable bus and a working school first and a freer debate second. A democracy that cannot supply the first will struggle to sell the second.
America’s Vetocracy
That is where the United States should worry. In April, Gallup found just 10 percent of Americans approve of Congress, one point above the record low set in 2013, with 86 percent disapproving. Last fall the government shut down for 43 days, the longest full shutdown in American history, and the Congressional Budget Office estimates the economy permanently lost about $11 billion. This spring the Department of Homeland Security went unfunded for a record 76 days. Continuing resolutions stand in for budgets. A typical federal environmental impact statement takes about four and a half years before a shovel moves. California voters approved high-speed rail in 2008 at an estimated $33 billion; the state’s own estimate is now $126 billion, and the first passengers are not expected until the 2030s. Over the same years, China built more than 50,000 kilometers of high-speed track, more than the rest of the world combined.
The same pattern now reaches the top of the world. As Arctic ice retreats, Chinese container ships recently completed their first season of regular weekly service to Europe along Russia’s northern coast, cutting the Suez voyage nearly in half. America’s answer is a heavy icebreaker contracted in 2019 for delivery in 2024; the GAO now expects it in 2033. Until then, the Coast Guard’s only working heavy icebreaker is the Polar Star, commissioned in 1976. Congress paid for these ships. Washington simply could not get them built.
Francis Fukuyama calls this a “vetocracy,” a system so well defended against overreach that it is also defended against action. Gridlock is usually treated as a domestic annoyance. Abroad, every stalled American project is free advertising for Beijing.
When Pressure Worked
Democracies can still move fast when someone applies pressure on purpose. For years, polite diplomacy left most European allies short of even NATO’s 2 percent defense target. The Trump administration took a blunter, transactional approach, and much of the foreign-policy establishment called it reckless. Yet at The Hague in June 2025, every ally except Spain, which negotiated its way out, committed to spend 5 percent of GDP on defense and security by 2035, with 3.5 percent for core military needs. This March, NATO reported that European allies and Canada had raised real defense spending by 20 percent in 2025, and that for the first time every member cleared the 2 percent bar.
The method has costs. Alliances rest partly on predictability, and an adversary who cannot tell which commitments are firm may miscalculate. Still, deliberate pressure inside an existing structure broke an inertia that decades of consensus diplomacy could not.
Reforms Worth Debating
None of this argues for abandoning checks and balances. It argues for sorting the checks that produce accountability from those that merely produce paralysis. Several reforms would push the system toward delivery without touching the Constitution: a narrow filibuster exception for infrastructure and budget bills; sunset dates that force major programs to be reauthorized on a schedule rather than run on autopilot; and a public, plain-English scorecard for every large federal project. Congress already accepts the logic of the first idea, since budget reconciliation bills cannot be filibustered. In my years running R&D programs, a project with no milestones was one nobody could kill or save.
A bolder idea deserves debate, if only for what it forces us to confront: a president elected to a single, non-renewable term of five or six years, with narrow authority to break legislative deadlock on designated infrastructure and economic bills, subject to full judicial review. It would require a constitutional amendment and carries real risk of abuse, so it should be considered only with guardrails at least as strong as the power it grants. But removing the reelection motive would strip out much of the posturing that fuels gridlock today.
The postwar assumption that democracy wins by default, whether or not it delivers, is wearing thin across the developing world and, increasingly, at home. Ordinary people need full refrigerators more than fine speeches. The contest with China will not be settled by speeches about freedom. It will be settled in part by which system can pass a budget, build a bridge and keep a promise on time. If America keeps mistaking gridlock for principle, it will keep handing its rivals their best argument.
Meda Parameswara Reddy, Ph.D., is the Director of the Reddy Center for Critical and Integrated Thinking.
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Why America Must Rethink Its Counterterrorism Strategy in Nigeria
Nov 11, 2026
When American forces conducted airstrikes against suspected Islamic State militants in northwest Nigeria on Christmas Day 2025, the operation signaled a renewal of security cooperation between Washington and Abuja. Yet for Nigerians living in communities plagued by terrorism, kidnapping, and armed attacks, a critical question remained: Will these strikes make their daily lives any safer?
That question demands serious consideration in Washington. The United States has spent decades helping Nigeria combat terrorism through military equipment, intelligence sharing, and tactical training. Yet, armed violence continues to disrupt daily life across northern Nigeria, raising doubts about how the effectiveness of American counterterrorism assistance should be measured.
The December operations followed a diplomatic dispute in which President Donald Trump accused Nigeria of failing to protect Christians and threatened military intervention. Nigeria subsequently welcomed U.S. assistance, leading to coordinated strikes against suspected militants in Sokoto State.
While military strikes can disrupt terrorist operations, destroy equipment, and neutralize commanders, they cannot single-handedly guarantee community safety or restore public trust in government institutions.
The United States and Nigeria have maintained security ties for over five decades. According to a 2024 State Department fact sheet, Washington held $590 million in active government-to-government military sales cases with Nigeria. Major transactions included a $497 million deal for 12 A-29 Super Tucano aircraft and a $997 million deal for 12 AH-1Z attack helicopters.
Between fiscal years 2019 and 2023, the United States also provided more than $8 million in counterterrorism training, equipment, and advisory support, along with approximately $5 million for international military education and training. These figures encompass various programs and stages of assistance rather than a single lump sum already expended.
This partnership extends beyond defense hardware to include military professionalization, intelligence sharing, border security, and initiatives to enhance accountability within Nigeria's security sector.
Although these investments have strengthened aspects of Nigeria's military capabilities, civilians' persistent vulnerability raises a broader question: How should success ultimately be defined?
In northeastern Nigeria, Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) have sustained an insurgency that has devastated communities across the Lake Chad Basin. Meanwhile, in the northwest, armed bandit networks have expanded kidnapping for ransom, cattle rustling, and raids on rural settlements. Although some groups operate in overlapping areas, their motivations and organizational structures differ significantly.
That distinction matters: treating every armed group strictly as a terrorist organization risks overlooking the criminal economies, local grievances, and law enforcement failures that sustain different forms of violence.
The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) recorded more than 400 kidnapping incidents across northwest Nigeria in 2026 by the time of its analysis. In June, at least 39 civilians were abducted in Maradun, Zamfara State, after traveling to negotiate peace terms with an armed group.
A separate ACLED assessment found that armed bandits accounted for more than 80 percent of recorded mass abductions since the beginning of 2025.
These figures do not mean U.S. counterterrorism operations have failed; rather, they demonstrate that Nigeria's civilian security crisis extends far beyond the militant organizations targeted by airstrikes.
Having reported on terrorism and violent conflict in northern Nigeria, I have witnessed how insecurity paralyzes communities long after the immediate violence subsides. Farmers struggle to cultivate their fields, families live in constant fear, and residents face travel restrictions that disrupt ordinary economic and social life.
For those living under these conditions, security is measured less by the body count of neutralized militants than by whether they can travel safely, earn a living, and send their children to school.
This is where Washington should reconsider its approach.
The United States and Nigeria have already recognized the necessity of broader security reforms. During the 2024 U.S.–Nigeria Binational Commission, both governments committed to expanding military and law enforcement cooperation while prioritizing civilian protection, human rights, and democratic principles.
They proposed establishing a standing security working group and enhancing joint efforts in border and aviation security, anti-terrorist financing, criminal investigations, and explosives detection. Discussions also focused on creating specialized police anti-kidnapping units, improving oversight mechanisms, mapping crime, advancing police reform, and strengthening judicial institutions.
Furthermore, their commitments encompassed civilian harm mitigation, community peacebuilding, farmer–herder conflict resolution, and the safeguarding of freedom of expression, peaceful assembly, and religious liberty.
These mutual agreements offer a framework for evaluating whether security cooperation is making a tangible difference on the ground. Washington should actively advocate for transparent assessments of civilian casualties, kidnapping metrics, accountability for human rights abuses, and the safe return of displaced communities.
It should also invest in supporting Nigerian civil and judicial institutions capable of investigating and prosecuting violent crimes, rather than relying primarily on military solutions.
While protecting religious freedom must remain a priority, Nigeria's security crisis cannot be viewed solely through the lens of attacks on Christian communities. Muslims have also suffered extensively from terrorism and banditry. A comprehensive policy aimed at protecting all civilians will far better address the nation's complex security realities.
The stakes extend well beyond Nigeria's borders. As Africa's most populous nation and a key regional democracy, Nigeria is central to West African stability and global cooperation. Persistent insecurity erodes public confidence in elected leaders, suppresses civic participation, and creates power vacuums that armed groups exploit.
For the United States, supporting Nigeria involves far more than neutralizing terrorist organizations—it means helping a strategic democratic partner build trusted governance and judicial institutions.
A robust bilateral relationship should align security assistance with civilian protection, public accountability, and sustained diplomatic engagement. Such an approach would demonstrate that U.S. foreign policy can effectively advance democratic governance while confronting violent extremism.
Ultimately, the success of U.S.–Nigeria counterterrorism efforts must be judged by whether ordinary Nigerians can live free from fear, participate in civic life, and trust the institutions charged with their protection. Until these outcomes serve as the primary metrics of progress, even successful military strikes will remain an incomplete response to Nigeria's complex security challenges.
Idris Mohammed is a Ph.D. student at the University of Alabama concentrating in Journalism & Creative Media and a fall Fulcrum Fellow.
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US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on October 28, 2026.
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Pete Hegseth and the High Price of Compromised Governance
Nov 10, 2026
Just days after a historic midterm election in which everyday Americans sent a clear, undeniable demand for political accountability and transparency, the halls of Congress have devolved into a new theater of crisis. Republican Representative Thomas Massie’s introduction of eight articles of impeachment against Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has thrown the Department—and the nation’s fragile democratic norms—into uncharted territory.
Massie, a longtime Trump critic who plans to retire from Congress at the end of the year, accuses Hegseth of bypassing Congress and violating constitutional limits on war powers.
Speaking on the House floor, Massie argued that Hegseth had overstepped his authority through U.S. military action involving Iran. Hegseth “has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as secretary of defense,” Massie said, adding that he “has demonstrated that he will remain a threat to the Constitution if allowed to remain in office, and has acted in a manner grossly incompatible with his duties and the rule of law.”
According to Massie’s announcement, the first article “charges Secretary Hegseth with waging the Iran war despite no declaration of war, statutory authorization, attack on the United States, or imminent threat.” The article further asserts that “it establishes that the war was unlawful from its inception.”
There is little doubt that Hegseth's turbulent tenure deserves fierce criticism. From allegations of bypassing the War Powers Resolution by launching unauthorized military actions in Iran and Yemen, to the tragic strike on an Iranian school that resulted in mass civilian casualties, his leadership has operated on a doctrine of unilateral defiance. Add to that the extrajudicial targeting of crews in the Pacific, the reckless capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, and chilling threats to prosecute critics like Senator Mark Kelly for exercising free speech, and we see an administrator who treats international law and constitutional constraints as mere suggestions. Hegseth’s ongoing assault on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives has already compromised internal national security and alienated the very communities that make our military strong. By any objective metric of steady governance, his record is an absolute failure.
But as a journalist and advocate for systemic democratic reform, I am compelled to look past the political theater and ask the central, sobering question: Does Pete Hegseth legally deserve impeachment?
Under Article II, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution, impeachment requires a threshold of "Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors." The legal case brought by Massie holds genuine structural merit, particularly regarding the separation of powers. Waging unauthorized warfare in direct violation of statutory law and intentionally subverting Congressional oversight represent exactly the kind of executive overreach the Founders sought to curb.
Yet, history and recent political reality remind us that impeachment is rarely a purely legal exercise—it is inherently a political instrument. As Jonah Goldberg recently noted in The Fulcrum regarding the broader debates surrounding accountability in this administration, the line between constitutional duty and political strategy is dangerously thin. If the House moves forward with a vote within the required 48 hours, it risks hyper-politicizing what should be a sober legal process. With House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries signaling a united Democratic front and the slim Republican majority teetering on a knife's edge, a vote to impeach might satisfy a desperate public hunger for accountability, but it could further fracture an already broken legislative branch.
Which brings us to the final dilemma: Should Donald Trump fire him?
For the sake of our national security and global standing, the answer is an unequivocal yes. President Trump has spent the days following the midterms trapped in an alternate-reality delusion, refusing to accept that voters delivered a devastating verdict on his administration’s chaotic governance. Defending Hegseth as the victim of a "political sham" only deepens this blindness.
True leadership requires recognizing when a cabinet official has become a liability to the republic. Leaving Hegseth at the helm of our military forces further isolates America on the world stage and erodes domestic trust. Trump should fire Hegseth immediately to restore structural integrity to our defense institutions—not to appease Congress, but to show that his administration can, for once, prioritize the stability of our democracy over personal loyalty.
Because Massie introduced the measure as a privileged resolution, House Republican leaders must bring the impeachment articles to the floor within two legislative days. GOP lawmakers could also move to table or dismiss the measure, but doing so would require support from a majority of the House.
The House needs only a simple majority to approve the articles of impeachment. If adopted, the matter would then move to the Senate, where senators would decide whether to convict Hegseth and remove him from office.
Hugo Balta is the executive editor of The Fulcrum and the publisher of the Latino News Network
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New federal law already targets PBM pricing and rebate practices. An opinion on why state pharmacy ownership bans go too far, and the freight-rail lesson.
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State Healthcare Reforms Have Gone Off the Rails
Nov 09, 2026
Government generally has two ways to address problems in a marketplace. It can establish clear rules, target harmful conduct and let competition produce better outcomes. Or it can design the market itself by controlling business decisions and dictating how companies must operate. That is the decision facing lawmakers in healthcare today.
America's freight-rail experience shows what is at stake. For decades, the Interstate Commerce Commission controlled railroad rates, restricted routes and made it hard for carriers to shed unprofitable lines. Intended to stabilize an essential industry, the rules instead contributed to bankruptcies and lagging investment.
Congress changed direction with the Staggers Rail Act of 1980. The law preserved protections against unreasonable rates and anticompetitive conduct but gave railroads greater freedom to set prices, negotiate contracts and organize their networks. As a result, inflation-adjusted freight rates fell by nearly half over the ensuing decades while freight volume grew by more than 50 percent.
The lesson was not that government has no regulatory role. It was that regulation works best when it addresses identifiable misconduct without substituting political judgment for competition. The modern debate over pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, presents much the same choice.
PBMs administer prescription-drug benefits for insurers and government health plans. They negotiate discounts and rebates with drug manufacturers, determine which drugs are covered, contract with pharmacies and process claims. Many also run their own pharmacies to help lower drug prices. Health plans hire them to use their purchasing power and expertise to control costs.
Critics contend that some PBM practices produce conflicts of interest or higher costs. They point to rebate arrangements, spread pricing (charging a health plan more for a prescription than the PBM reimburses the pharmacy), and incentives that may favor drugs with higher list prices. PBMs have also been accused of steering patients toward affiliated pharmacies and underpaying independent ones.
These concerns deserve serious consideration. But the real question is not whether challenges exist, but which remedies address them without unnecessarily restricting competition or market choice.
Washington has chosen the targeted approach. Through Section 6224 of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026, Congress restricted how PBMs serving Medicare plans may be compensated, required rebates and discounts to be passed through to plan sponsors, mandated detailed reporting and provided sponsors with extensive audit rights. Other provisions establish transparency and rebate protections for employer-sponsored health plans.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), meanwhile, has pursued enforcement actions targeting the same pricing, rebate, and transparency concerns. Its settlements require contract options that calculate patients' costs closer to net prices, pass rebates through at the pharmacy counter, let health plans move away from spread pricing and guaranteed-rebate arrangements, and offer community pharmacies cost-plus reimbursement.
Taken together, the federal law and settlements show how targeted intervention can address the practices that prompted calls for PBM reform without displacing market choice. They impose enforceable rules while leaving employers and health plans free to choose among competing arrangements.
The Trump administration has effectively chosen this approach: address the specific practices driving concerns about PBMs without dictating how companies must structure their businesses. With those reforms now in place, states pursuing far more sweeping measures should have to explain what problem remains that requires breaking apart lawful businesses.
Arkansas enacted the nation's first law barring PBMs from owning or operating pharmacies. Tennessee has since enacted its FAIR Rx Act. Both laws face legal challenges, and a federal court has temporarily blocked the Arkansas measure, but that has not stopped lawmakers elsewhere from considering similar proposals.
These mandates are not an indictment of any one business practice but of an industry as a whole. A PBM could comply fully with every federal requirement, abandon disputed pricing practices and offer transparent contracts, and still be forced to restructure or withdraw its pharmacy operations. This would disrupt pharmacy access for millions and could set a troubling precedent for other businesses weighing investments based on what were previously settled rules.
The contrast is clear. In a free and fair marketplace, government should establish clear rules, punish demonstrated misconduct, and step back to let competition determine how businesses organize. An industry's political unpopularity is not a reason to abandon those principles, and neither is the fact that some critics have a legitimate case.
There is also a more basic question: How does forcing a PBM to sell or close a pharmacy make a prescription less expensive? Ownership bans do not themselves lower a drug's list price, increase manufacturer discounts, or reduce a patient's copay. They dictate who may own a pharmacy without demonstrating how that restructuring lowers healthcare costs.
States pursuing ownership bans are choosing a far more sweeping approach. When government can address specific problems directly, forcing companies to divest lawful businesses is difficult to justify as consumer protection. It is government-directed market restructuring, and lawmakers should be wary of the precedent it sets.
Jack Yoest is an Associate Professor of Practice at The Catholic University of America's Busch School of Business. He served as Assistant Secretary for Health and Human Resources for the Commonwealth of Virginia and is the author of Learning to Win: The 45 Laws of the Public Policy Process.
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