It warmed the heart of this old supply-side, free-trade, pro-growth, Abraham Lincoln Republican to hear our president extol the centrality of entrepreneurship and capital formation for the people of the Middle East and to see him expound on the indispensability of property rights, sound business development and liberalized trade.
To quote the president, "By replacing corruption and self-dealing with free markets and fair laws the people of the Middle East will grow in prosperity and freedom." And by the way, lest we sound smug and self-righteous, we still have a ways to go to eliminate corruption and self-dealing of our own on Wall Street.
The president's proposal of a Middle East free-trade area can be just the beginning.
It provides the foundation for new thinking about an area-wide plan to bring prosperity, liberalization and democratic development to the region - a 21st century Marshall Plan, if you will, for Iraq, Afghanistan and the entire Central Asia and Middle East regions and eventually all of Africa.
I have been writing about such a plan for almost a year now since I spoke at the Fortune CEO Conference last summer, where I met King Abdullah of Jordan. I discussed the idea with the king and subsequently discussed it with Prince Hassan of Jordan, who recently wrote me in support of the idea and to inform me of his own work on a Muslim benevolent fund to help underwrite such a plan.
The idea of direct involvement by the people of the regions is critical, and it is essential that we find a way to provide for ongoing consultation among Western experts and the people. We learned from the original Marshall Plan in Europe after World War II how essential it was for the Germans and Japanese themselves to design their new institutions and new policies and how valuable was the consultation and the give and take that occurred between Americans and the people of Europe and Japan as new market-oriented democracies were created.
In the president's speech, he spoke of liberty and justice being found in every human heart, including in the hearts of the men and women of the Muslim world who make up one-fifth of all humanity. "Freedom has advanced," he said, "because it is a way to lift millions out of poverty and improve their lives." The president has launched the world on a great new adventure, and it is up to every one of us, in every way we can, to do our part in helping bring peace and prosperity to all mankind.