Kudos to Chris Smith

I had my first encounter with Congressman Christopher Smith over a decade ago when I was a staffer on Capitol Hill. The then “baby freshman Congressman” (as we said) had introduced a resolution supporting the then banned Ukrainian Catholic Church, and there was also a resolution pending on the 1933 Ukrainian Famine. The then chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee announced that there were too many resolutions, and one would have to go. “You can probably roll Chris Smith, but he's a good guy,” my colleague from one Congressman's office told me.

“Let's accommodate him,” I replied, and we came up with compromise language and checked with the relevant parties to make certain everybody was happy. Mr. Smith signed on as a cosponsor.

I recall this to point out that the powerful chairman of the US Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe is one of Ukraine's oldest and best friends in Washington. I doubt he gets rolled very often these days. When even such a friend expresses his deep concern about Ukraine's rampant corruption, threats to the freedom of expression, anemic efforts at reform, and the shadow being cast on the upcoming presidential election, there is plenty to be concerned about.

Volodymyr Skatchko brilliantly analyzes why the state is making no real progress and points to the unspoken gentlemen's agreement between the current President and his Communist “opponents.” Add to this the utterly pie-in-the-sky draft budget that has been submitted to Parliament. “Revenue enhancement” in an environment, where the tax burden is such that business is forced to flee farther and farther into the shadows, simply has no meaning in the real world, and nobody is going to pay for privatized enterprises what they are asking in one of the world's worst business climates. This country needs not “revenue enhancement” but spending cuts so that the state can demand less money, and people can get on with the business of business. I cannot believe that anyone, including international financial institutions, can fail to understand this.

They have a saying here: “Poor because stupid, stupid because poor.” I simply cannot believe this after reading how unemployed miner Oleksandr Loza succeeded in setting up a virtually independent state with nothing but his own two hands. He is a brilliant example of what Ukrainians can do when they know they have a real chance to work for themselves. With such people this country could overcome its perennial crisis in six months if only the government would be cut back to point where it ceases to strangle the profitable, honest, and open production of goods and services.

Rep. Smith is right that the outside world should continue to help Ukraine. The problem is that with such a regime, everyone has a very difficult time figuring out precisely how that can be done.