Welcome to the latest long-distance Lowy Institute event. I'm Lydia Khalil, a research fellow at the West Asia Program at the Lowy Institute, and today I'm joined by Dr. Megan O'Sullivan. Megan O'Sullivan is a professor of practice of international affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School. She's also chair of the North American Group of the Trilateral Commission. Dr. O'Sullivan served as a special assistant to the president and a deputy national security advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan under President George W. Bush. She's been awarded the Distinguished Public Service Medal, the Defense Department's highest honor for civilians, and was awarded the State Department's superior honor award many times. She's also the author of three books, including her most recent, Windfall, How the New Energy Abundance Upends Global Politics and Strengthens America's Power. Megan, welcome, and thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, Lydia. It's a pleasure to be here with you and the Lowy Institute. Well, since we're going to be delving into the legacy of the September 11th attacks on U.S. foreign policy, and given that these attacks define the careers of a generation of policymakers, I thought I'd first begin by asking you, what was your experience of the day? What were your reflections? What were you doing in September 2001? Sure. Before I answer that question, I feel like there's something remiss in your introduction, which is you didn't tell our audience that you and I actually know one another from long ago, because we met in Baghdad, working in Baghdad back in 2003. I very much have those times in mind seeing you, and I'm looking forward to talking about some of that and some of the consequences surrounding that. But let me get to the question you asked about the actual day of September 11th. I was in Washington, D.C. I had not yet done into government. I was at the Brookings Institution where I was a young postdoctoral fellow and I was actually working on completing a manuscript, a book about state sponsors of terrorism when September 11th happened. I remember seeing it, watching it from the auditorium at the Brookings Institution, and I've been into that auditorium maybe a hundred times since then, but I never fails to evoke that moment very sharply for me. It was as you said, like many people of my generation, it was a very consequential day in so many respects. For me, it really solidified my commitment to government. Up until that point, I had largely been in a kind of academic policy think tank world, writing books and articles on American foreign policy. But September 11th really crystallized for me the importance of not just having good ideas but turning those ideas into action. I had a family member who died in the World Trade Center that day, and my commitment to trying to serve in government really was sharpened at that moment, and it really influenced my course going forward as well as so many of the much, much larger things we're going to talk about today. Absolutely. Those attacks also prompted the Bush administration at the time to push for a congressional resolution authorizing the use of force against those responsible for the 9-11 attacks. This resolution would then be used to justify invading Afghanistan as the Taliban were harboring al-Qaeda. Can you envision a scenario, especially at that time given the urgency and the emotion where the United States would not have retaliated militarily after those attacks? Perhaps people say, you know, if there was a different administration or what other policy options that were potentially discarded. I guess what I'm really asking is was this really a war of necessity? I would say that yes, it was a military force was not inevitable but almost inevitable. If you think back to that time and you look back on what policymakers were deliberating at the time, you will remember that actually the Bush administration put forward an ultimatum to the Taliban, which was the entity that was in charge of Afghanistan at the time. The ultimatum was basically to hand over the senior members of al-Qaeda to the United States. It was the Taliban's refusal to do that, that really launched the military component of the campaign. I think for those who might sit back and say, well, there were other policy tools that might have been invoked. Often the United States or its allies have used sanctions and circumstances where they want to extract something from a regime that it doesn't have a good relationship with. I think it's really important to remember, and it's often hard to recreate or to evoke that sense of fear and nervousness that existed at the time, and people in the administration very much feared that the 9-11 attack was the first of potentially many attacks, and so there wasn't a sense that there was time to let other policy tools work. I think military force was warranted, and I think it was absolutely the right decision at the time. I think the controversy around Afghanistan and the legitimate debates really come from the action after that initial foray, which of course was done with the support of NATO that invoked Article 5 for the first time in its history after 9-11. Here we are 20 years later with the US war in Afghanistan coming to its end. The Taliban is once again in control. President Biden was adamant really about withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan, and he argued that many US voters had demanded it, and especially the developments of the past weeks with the collapse of the constitutional Afghan government dissipating with President Ghani fleeing, the rapid military losses on the ground reinforced that ending US military's involvement in Afghanistan was the right decision. Yet you argue differently. You wrote recently in a Washington Post op-ed that it was the wrong decision to pull US troops out of Afghanistan. Walk us through your argument. Sure. First, let me just address this question that American voters the public demanded this. I would say this had not been a really salient issue in the American public debate. I can't really remember a single exchange or, you know, voters demanding that the next president take action to withdraw from Afghanistan. I think this was an issue that was, of course, important to Americans, but not on the forefront of their minds. And when you have the overwhelming majority of Americans answering the question, do you want US forces out of Afghanistan? They said yes. And, you know, I would say yes to that question, too. But the real question is, you know, under what circumstances at what cost, you know, what kinds of consequences are you willing to see as a result? And I think many Americans in the last few weeks were shocked by what they saw and were not prepared for the possibility of something in the way that they have. And, you know, I hate to say this, but I imagine that there will be scenarios in coming weeks that Americans will also say, well, you know, I wanted US troops out of Afghanistan, but not necessarily at the risk of a massive humanitarian crisis, which may unfold in the coming weeks in Afghanistan due to the paucity of food and other things. Or, you know, hopefully not, but if we have the reemergence of terrorist threats from Afghanistan in future months or years, I think Americans will consider that to have been a pretty significant caveat on their desire to see US forces out. But, you know, to get to the argument that I was making or really to respond to the Biden administration's claim that, you know, it was time to take US forces out because US forces weren't there to bring about democracy. They didn't see any prospect of a peace agreement between the Taliban or the Afghan government. And as a result, they saw no reason why the US should continue to keep troops there indefinitely. And I'd say this is really a misframing of the argument and that it's really misleading to tie American true presence to the idea of a peace agreement or even the foundations of a democracy. As Australians know, as well as Americans, because Australians obviously were there with us in Afghanistan for all this time, that, you know, the real basic reason why coalition forces were in Afghanistan has not so much to do with the fabric of a democratic system, but it really has to do with providing a semblance of security in Afghanistan. And I think that, you know, we can say undoubtedly after 20 years that al-Qaeda was seriously degraded in Afghanistan, but it wasn't eliminated and the threat that terrorist groups could pose in Afghanistan was tempered by the existence of coalition forces in a backup capacity to Afghan forces. And so what I argued to the administration and in a public forum like the Washington Post is that our presence had changed so dramatically over these 20 years. We went from a peak of 140,000 US and coalition forces at the height of the surge in 2000, around 2010 down to, you know, only 3,000 US forces and maybe two and a half times that in coalition forces. And that relatively small military footprint was actually commensurate with our interest. It wasn't enough to ensure that the Afghan government would be victorious over the Taliban, but it was enough to provide a semblance of stability that really staved off the worst case scenario, which is, of course, terrorist groups reconstituting in Afghanistan. And that was a part of a congressional study group here in the United States that met over the course of most of 2020. And we heard very clearly from military and intelligence analysts that it was their assessment that if US and coalition forces left precipitously that those terrorist groups would be able to reconstitute and to provide, and the quote was, a sufficient threat to the US homeland in 18 to 36 months. So for me, you know, I really felt like our presence had changed enough, had become so minimal compared to what it had been in the past, that it was now commensurate with a lower level of US and coalition interests, but not zero. But I think this was a very hard argument to ask the administration to make to Americans because it would have amounted to saying, let me talk to you about this forever war idea. That's not what it looks like. And let me talk to you about a potentially much longer US presence in Afghanistan, one that isn't really, it doesn't lead to any kind of unequivocal victory, but one that has the virtue of staving off a worst case scenario that nobody wants to see. So that's actually a great segue into my next question because I was going to ask you about this forever war framing. You know, you've also argued and you've put in a pretty articulate rationale for the maintenance of a limited amount of US troop presence in Afghanistan because the US troop withdrawal doesn't necessarily mark the end of the forever wars of this September 11th era that it's merely ushered in a new phase. So are we to take it that the legacy of September 11th is just going to keep going? Is there ever an end where we could see a clear US disengagement from conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan? Or should we have expected kind of the maintenance of that minimal military presence that you've spoken about? Sure, I mean, I think first to your point about this isn't the end of the forever wars. The first thing I would say is because US military troops leave a theater, as you know, Lydia, that doesn't mean that peace breaks out and it doesn't mean that US interests are no longer involved there. And so I think that that's something that was very true when we look at Iraq at the end of 2011 when all US troops came out of Iraq under President Obama. This didn't mark the end of conflict in Iraq. It just led to a new phase where you had actually an increased tempo of conflict just not involving US troops. But of course, it's still involved US interests so much so that the United States actually had to reengage militarily in Iraq a few years later when ISIS took over more than a third of the country. And again, as I alluded to in my previous answer, I think that we run the risk of not the same thing happening in Afghanistan but certainly discovering that even though we've left the theater and there are those who will claim this forever war is over, the reality is that interests be it massive flows of immigration, be it a significant humanitarian crisis, be it the reconstitution of terrorist groups will necessitate continued US involvement in some ways. So I think in that respect, this claiming the forever war is over is not accurate. But to get to your larger question about are these forever wars ever going to be over? And my answer would be, let me develop this a little bit, but my answer was that we really had more or less ended the forever war in the sense of America in endless combat in these venues. It had found what I thought should have been a sustainable model going forward. And that was where US forces were no longer the dominant forces on the frontline in Iraq or Afghanistan, but you had a very small American footprint in both of these countries that was supportive of a much larger indigenous effort. And that this in my mind was not a forever war. I mean, nobody calls South Korea a forever war because we have 25,000 troops there and we don't have a peace agreement there. It's a different kind of setup. And in my mind, the parallel isn't perfect, but I do think we needed to think about that we might need to have a small presence that was a non-combat operation in support of a larger indigenous force that was actually taking care of security and fighting the tough additional security force in doing they taken 70,000 casualties over the previous years. And I think what we learned from the last few weeks is not that those forces were a charade. I think that some of the commentary that's out there in the public, but I think what we learned, and this is not a surprise to those of us who have worked on these areas, we learned that those forces continued to need a coalition backbone to function. And that's not surprising again because of the way those forces were built. They were built to rely upon the intelligence, the reconnaissance, the evacuation, the maintenance supports of both contractors and coalition forces, even though they're a very small number. And when you withdrew those things and you combine that with the reality that the Afghan national security forces hadn't been paid for the most part in more than eight months. And the fact that the force that was to be backing up the Afghan national security forces actually cut a deal with the Taliban, the enemy that these forces were fighting to withdraw completely. You can see how there was a lot of demoralization and then a collapse of the forces when it no longer seemed feasible to keep fighting in the absence of coalition support in the face of the Taliban. So again, I think that this runs and maybe we'll get to this later, but we run the risk of really learning the wrong lessons here. When we couch everything in a forever war and we don't talk about different phases of this war, phases that were incredibly costly, incredibly painful for the United States and its coalition partners when we were on the front lines, where we were the ones fighting and contrast that with a different model where we had a small footprint in support of a much larger indigenous force that was doing the fighting. These are two things that have been conflated. So let's bring it back to Iraq, the other conflict of September 11th that you alluded to earlier in your remarks. It's one that's now widely considered to be assessed as a strategic mistake. As you mentioned, both you and I were involved as governance advisors, assisting the Iraqi interim government on behalf of the US administration after Saddam Hussein was deposed. And I don't know about you, but one of the things that I struggle with is, do you agree that it was a strategic mistake that the US should never have invaded Iraq on the pretenses outlined by the Bush administration or at all? Or were there decisions that could have been made or policy options not taken in the execution of the US involvement in Iraq that would have led to different outcomes in Iraq? Right. No, I think this is a question that all of us who were involved in Iraq over that time and subsequent to that time struggle with. And let me share with you how I think about it. Although, of course, I'm still wrestling with a lot of these questions on a regular basis as well. First, I'd like to separate the decision to go to war in Iraq into two pieces. One, I think is, if we look at the decision to go to war and we think about the moment that the Bush administration President Bush found himself in and we think about the information that he and others believe to be true and we think about the post 9-11 environment. I think there it is not unreasonable to think that he or another president was right in making that decision based on the information that was available at the time. I'm certainly somebody having discussed this with President Bush personally on numerous occasions. I do not believe that they were making up reasons to invade Iraq. I believe they firmly believed the information that they had at the time and that led to that decision. That's a different question than the question I think you're asking, which is the question about, now that we know what we do know, now that we know we have the benefit of hindsight, we know the enormous costs that resulted from the invasion of Iraq, now that we know the cost to coalition, lives, treasure to the reputation of the United States, now that we know that WMD was not present and actually Saddam Hussein was just trying to keep the mirage of having WMD in order to maintain a balance of power with Iran, now that we know these things, I think it's unquestionable that it was a strategic mistake to invade Iraq, given those realities. So I think that's how I think about the decision to go in and if decision makers at the time knew everything they knew that we know today, I don't think there's any way that that decision would have been made. And I think even if it had been known that there was not WMD in Iraq at the time, I think that all of the other arguments for the invasion of Iraq would have been insufficient to get America to where it actually did execute the war. That said, I don't think that is mutually exclusive with your other issue, which is like, what was the implementation? Was there something wrong with the way that the United States and its coalition partners went about trying to not just remove Saddam from power, but trying to rebuild Iraq in a way that it could be a source of stability in the region, rather than otherwise. And there I think there's enough fault to go around as well. I think there were, it was inevitably going to be a very hard task to take on rebuilding Iraq, I think was going to be much more difficult than even people who thought it was going to be difficult discovered. But there were certainly things that we did that I think unfortunately and inadvertently made it much harder than it had to be. I mean, there's a long list of these things, but probably you and I would agree that one of them is debathification, a policy of lustration that in my mind, there needed to be some sort of policy along those lines, but the way this was executed and implemented, I think really created additional and unnecessary challenges going forward. There's also the issue of just not providing enough US or other troops to provide security in the interim so that the Iraqi forces could build up and strengthen power. And that I think led and contributed to the rise of sectarian violence in Iraq. So, I mean, there were many implementation things that given that we did invade Iraq and unseat Saddam, then we might have done things very differently. I'm sure like you, or like me, probably not a lot of time goes by where you don't wish you had the opportunity to do something differently in that theater. Well, you mentioned that the US, of course, having invaded is a prime actor in the conflict in Iraq and in Afghanistan, but obviously it's not the only actor. And I'm really interested to hear about your experiences wrangling with the various Iraqi interests, for example, because I think there's an impression out there that what policy the United States wants to implement will happen, but there's a great variety of other interests there. So could you tell us a bit about your experience negotiating with Iraqi actors and factions at the time? Sure, there's so many examples to draw from. And I smiled, whether or not I was on camera or off, I don't know, but certainly our experience is anything from what the United States decides it should happen is what actually happens. And I think that there over time, there has been more humility in the execution of the policy and it's in a greater recognition about that the US isn't in a position to forget about dictate. I don't think we ever tried to dictate, but we really did try to move things in a certain direction. And we often tried to move, not often, I would say we always tried to move things where we had Iraqi partners. It was never that we were the sole voice in the room trying to move Iraq in one direction or another, but it's a very fractured country and there are many, many different interests at play and there was nothing that I can remember that are Iraqis across a political or ethnic or sectarian spectrum agreed on. And so I think that was part of the challenge working in Iraq in the post-Sodam era. In terms of examples, one that I think might surprise some of our viewers do with Iraq and becoming a democracy. I think there's the impression that the US in particular kind of hoisted democracy on the Iraqis kind of compelled the Iraqis to opt for a democratic system, sort of push them in that direction. Certainly it was my experience and I'd be interested I don't know if I'm allowed to ask you questions but if it was yours as well, I felt more pull from the Iraqis on elections and democracy than push. And of course, elections and democracy are not the same thing, but if anything in those early years, the coalition in the United States was actually continuously saying, let's not rush to elections and Iraqis were saying, we want elections, we want elections because for them, they wanted a government that was accountable after years of living under Saddam, they wanted a government that had to answer to people. And secondly, people wanted to know who had the mantle to lead and they felt that elections was the best way of demonstrating that they actually had popular support. So again, democracy and elections are not the same thing, but I really found that there was a real desire on the part of Iraqis to move in the direction of a representative kind of polity and one where there was accountability among leaders. So I think again, there was constant negotiations but that was an area where there was some commonality at the beginning. Yeah, I'd say that would be my recollection as well and I remember well, particularly Ayatollah Sistani pushing for elections in Iraq and he was a very strong legitimate force that we had to listen to and to contend with in Iraq. And that might be getting in the weeds, I think a bit in Iraq policy of interest to some of our viewers, but I'm hoping we could take it back to Washington. So those are really interesting observations around wrangling policy in that post-conflict setting in Iraq. What was it like in Washington because not only did you serve in Iraq, but then you came back and worked as an advisor for President Bush. How was it like trying to push for your policy recommendations there? What was President Bush like as a decision maker? Sure, first just to situate us in time, I was in the Bush administration, I was initially at the State Department working there and then I went to Iraq and spent, well, I ended up spending a total of two years in Iraq off and on and then went to the White House. So I got to the White House towards the end of President Bush's first term. And so really interacted with him on a regular and sustained basis, really in his second term. And I would say that he really had evolved as a decision maker in some pretty significant ways. I'll talk a little bit about how I viewed him as a decision maker, but first I want to dissuade anyone from thinking that the primary job of a White House staffer is to push one's own policy. You asked like how successful or not successful was I at doing that? And really the core function of the national security staff at the White House is to try to, we call it manage the interagency, which is essentially to try to bring together the very disparate, often disparate interest in views of different agencies who may have equities in a problem, try to hammer out potential solutions, try to get agreement about the way ahead among the different actors. And if there isn't agreement to then present those options to the president or the national security advisor, whoever the appropriate principal is, and try to fairly represent all of them. So I would say I did do some policy advocacy, but that was really only when President Bush would ask me directly, well, Megan, what do you think? And he did that a fair amount as time went on, but I certainly tried to do both jobs, to be an advisor to the president, tell him what I think when he asked me, but also to fairly represent my colleagues in the room. So going back to President Bush as a decision maker, again, this is sort of the second term in that the place where I interacted with him the most was over the fairly long period of 2006 and 2007, or where I saw him act most as a decision maker was around the time that we were going through a very intense strategic review around our policy in Iraq. For those of you who remember Iraq in 2006, it was an incredibly difficult time. The country was effectively in a sectarian civil war with itself, very high casualties among Iraqi civilians, but also among coalition figures and American troops. And there was really a sense that America was failing and the war had been lost. We undertook a very extensive strategy review that went on for months and months in the US government and ultimately led in January, 2007, to now know as the surge. And here I would say, interacting with President Bush pretty much on a daily basis over this period of time, I really have a lot of admiration for how he tackled this problem. I mean, he was actually very respectful of process. I think a lot of the caricatures about him just don't prove true at all when I think about this period. He was someone who was really interested in learning the lessons that we had learned from our previous years in Iraq. He was really interested in listening to his advisors and his advisors were arguing very different things. So to me, I think back to a few meetings where one of his closest advisors was arguing something that had been argued multiple times throughout the process and he said, look, thank you, I've heard you, I've listened to your argument, but now I've decided to move us in a different direction and I hope you will be with me. And that to me was sort of almost a model of what you want to see at the highest echelons of government. You want to see senior people making passionate and well-recent arguments to the president or whoever the principal is and then the president making a clear decision and asking people to get behind him. And again, I think on this example of the surge, there never was one day where the president decided to do the surge. It was a whole series of decisions that ultimately led us to the place where this was the sensible policy. And in that respect, I really found that President Bush had a lot of qualities which are very difficult and rare in a policymaker. One of them was that he was really uncomfortable with uncertainty and with leaving things unresolved. So often there's a push, we need a solution, we need it now. And he left this question of what we should do open long enough for there to be debate, deliberation and analysis so that we actually got to an answer which I felt good about at the time. And I think proved to be the right answer in retrospect. So if I could take it to the present day with the withdrawal of Afghanistan, you've also argued, if I understand correctly that you believe that US allies in particular or we'll look at this withdrawal as a failure. And I'm wondering what you think that failure what implications that failure might have on US managing its alliances, its alliance relationships but also equally for managing its adversaries and adversarial relationships. I think one of the arguments that was articulated most frequently in relationship to this withdrawal was that withdrawing from Afghanistan was going to give America more bandwidth, more resources to deal with China. And I think that was one of the strong policy arguments that this was going to be that America needed to end this war so it could focus its attention on China. And I certainly agree that China is the biggest challenge to the United States and the US Chinese relationship is one that demands a lot of attention and resources and political focus, all of those things. But I actually don't agree with that rationale for a few reasons that have to do with alliances. I mean, there are a whole set of reasons that I think are misleading. The idea that somehow withdrawing 3000 troops from Afghanistan is going to provide an extra balance of power shifting resource in the Far East, I think is misplaced and arguments about cost I think are also misplaced because continuing to support the Afghan government or the Afghan security forces or to protect our counterterrorism interests from an overwatch position, all of those things either will be or would have been quite expensive as well. But the most important argument I think that you're saying has to do with the impact of this withdrawal on our alliances and our relationships with others adversaries as well as partners. And of course, I'm conscious that most of your audience is from Australia.  But I have to say, I've been really struck by the fact that the Biden administration came in and one of its number one priorities was to really reinvigorate its alliances. And basically we heard the language very strong and clear that America is back, that America is ready to resume positions of leadership after four years with an administration that showed great reluctance to do that. And I think the world was interested and ready to see what kind of commitment was able to be marshaled at a global level. And I feel like the withdrawal from Afghanistan is goes against that rhetoric in a very sharp way. I think it's hard to look at that and not call into question America's reliability to first and foremost the Afghans that we worked with for 20 years and that we asked to make a commitment to us and asked with us to work on a certain kind of future for Afghanistan, but also for our allies who were an extremely important part of that engagement. And we can see, I'm just pointing to public statements that a lot of NATO allies have made it quite clear that they did not feel they had been properly consistent, that they certainly objected to the decision, but they had no choice but to follow on withdrawing their own forces once America decided to do that. And I think we'll see that not only in rhetoric, but I think we'll also see it in actions. I mean, already just in the last couple of weeks, there are increasing calls in Europe for shoring up Europe's own defense capabilities apart from NATO, apart from the United States. And I think in other countries that maybe we have less overt alliances, there are countries that are kind of taking stock of their position and wondering if they should adjust their behavior. For one example, you think about many countries in the Gulf who have really relied on the United States as being behind them when it comes to any potential confrontation with Iran. I think some of those countries may be questioning how much they should be relying on the United States, then they should be actually trying to find a way to accommodate Iran a little bit better than they have in the past. Similarly, if you were Taiwanese, I imagine this hasn't been a great month for you because you might have put a lot of hope in knowing or thinking that the United States was squarely in your camp. If a confrontation unfolded with China, I think there are a lot of questions that people would be right to have at this point. So I think the implications and the consequences of this withdrawal are going to go well beyond the images that we've seen over the last couple of weeks. I'd like to be wrong and I'd love for you to tell me that that is not how Australians are feeling. And I'd certainly welcome hearing that, but I'm not sure that that is the conversation. Well, we're coming up to the 70th anniversary of the Anzis Alliance here in Australia, and I have to say it's certainly a live issue in a matter of great debate. Not that the rhetoric around alliances and shoring up these alliances from the Biden administration notwithstanding, there is a certain weariness within the American population it seems. A need to focus inward. And I'm wondering if you think that this is going to be a new phase of isolationism for the United States? Well, it's a tough month to argue against that thesis, right? It's a tough month to say that no, actually we're on the cusp of a new phase of really global leadership on the part of the United States. I think the reality is that if you look at the history of American foreign policy, that the tendency towards isolationism has waxed and waned over America's entire history. And that it's fair to say, we're in a period now, not so much where I think the average American questions alliances or things of that nature or their value. In fact, if you do look at polling, you can see that the overwhelming majority of Americans actually think alliances are important and that they believe in the value of those relationships. But I do think there's increasingly a sense, sort of twofold of, and I'm gonna not tell you anything that's not obvious, but increasingly a sense that Americans need to labor at home here and fix some fundamental problems here, whether it's infrastructure or the fabric of our own politics before we're going to be in a good position to lead abroad. And I think that that transcends party affiliation. I think you have Republicans and Democrats feeling that way. And I think we're seeing that coming into the conversation a lot more regularly than we had in previous years. And I guess I would even point to something that the Biden administration has talked a lot about and has begun to define a little bit more clearly. And this is the notion of a US foreign policy for the American middle class. And I think a lot of people have asked like, well, what exactly does that mean? And I think time will tell a little bit more, but it does seem to mean that actually when we look at relationships abroad, how do they influence middle America? And a lot of this may have to do with trade policy, with economics, are there economic benefits? At the end of the day, I feel pretty confident that in a world that's as globalized as the world we live in today, it'll be very hard for America to just kind of shrink back into a fully isolationist stance. I think at the end of the day, America's wellbeing is intimately tied to the global economy and also to kind of the global institutions and structures. But I do think it is going to be a patch where there's gonna be a pretty strong pull to look at America's challenges and its needs before trying to fix those overseas. I've never seen it as an either or, but it's an increasingly hard argument to make to the average American. Well, especially since one of the legacies of the Trump administration has been the erosion of democratic norms at home. But that brings me to kind of an exploration of another part of the legacy of September 11th, which is not just the kind of military interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan and the various counterterrorism missions, but it's the Bush administration's freedom agenda. And I'm wondering how you would write the effectiveness of the Bush administration's championing of democracy abroad. And what if anything, we've learned about the global democracy in this 20 year period? It's a very big question. I think, well, a couple of ways to respond. You know, the first thing I would say that there was a very clear rationale for the Bush administration really caring more and more about what's happening inside of countries rather than just in their external behavior. And I think this is really a legacy of 9-11, going back to the original purpose of our having this chat was that after 9-11, there was an awakening in the United States among senior administration officials that essentially we couldn't ignore what happened inside societies, what happened inside societies actually had direct security implications for the United States. So if there was disenfranchisement, dissatisfaction, disillusionment among a population in Saudi Arabia, radicalization of them, that obviously had a direct impact on the security of Americans. So that was like, I think that the beginning of or the roots of this interest in trying to help promote more democratic accountability overseas. But I would say let me take on directly since there's so many facets of this, let me take on directly what I think is the most prominent criticism of the Bush administration kind of freedom agendas. I think people frequently saw it as democratization at the barrel of the gun. That was the phrase that you hear all the time that it's basically like tying together military intervention with democratic promotion. And I think that was somewhat inevitable, that criticism somewhat inevitable because obviously the two largest efforts to promote a democratic system tied to the military invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. So these two things I think were bound to get conflated from the start. But a couple of things I would say to anybody about, first ever saw, and I don't believe that there was any kind of ideology connecting these. I think the militarization of the democratic agenda really had to do with the fact that there was insufficient capacity in the American system to do the things that America wanted to do. So that we ended up having our military involved in things that you would never want or imagine a military would be involved in. You would want civilians to take on those roads. You want civilians to be talking to Iraqis and Afghans and others about building more accountable political structures, but you actually had our military engaged in the conversations because there was a lack of capacity on the part of the United States to do these things. And I think that continues to be a legacy that we asked our military to do so many things that was really widely outside of its mission. Secondly, I'd go back to what we were saying earlier that I think a lot of the desire for democracy that we saw in many of these places was not being imposed by the United States but actually was coming from people in those countries. Maybe not the same understanding of what democracy meant, but I think it's overstated this idea that the Bush administration wasn't on democracy on people, I still think, and maybe this is my own colored glasses, but I still think in most cases, given the choice people would prefer to live in a democratic than in another kind of system. And then lastly, just my own reflection about this is I became an advocate for democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan or someone who was willing to live in Iraq to try to help Iraqis build a democracy, not because I had some ideological fixation that democracy was the most superior system, although I do believe that to be the case, but I thought that democracy was important because in such a divided society, such a fractured society, I didn't see any way of stability taking root unless there was a political system that was able to balance the competing interest of a wide variety of groups. I thought either there's going to be a Saddam or some authoritarian here or there was a democracy, but there wasn't a lot of room for other things and certainly the United States wasn't interested in going to Iraq and installing a dictator. So the alternative was a democracy that protected the rights of minorities and did its best to balance the multiple interests of a very large number of competing groups. So we've discussed how geostrategic competition with China is the likely next foreign policy challenge for the United States and its allies, but I'm wondering what else is or could be on the horizon? So many things. I mean, I think that's the geopolitical geostrategic issue that has the most attention here in the United States and rightly so. I would say if we're thinking for immediate sort of looking in the next year or so, one of the things that I think is going to pose a wide number of challenges to the international system is going to be potential crises in emerging markets. We were talking before we came on board about the pandemic and certainly we have major uneven distribution of vaccine around the world. We have countries that have assumed very large debt burdens, countries where you have millions of people who have been thrown into much more severe levels of poverty over the last 18 months. And so I think that emerging markets in the developing world, I think they are places where I'm nervous about what lies in the future. And I think there could be a lot of challenges of emerging out of those areas. The other thing which is, actually something that I think about today, it's something a reality today, and I think that we'll see increasingly over the coming years or decade is this whole issue of climate change. And what I mean by that, I mean, we're obviously very, very aware and certainly in Australia with fires and other natural disasters, we're aware of some of the geopolitical implications of climate change itself. Refugees maybe being the one that people seem to focus on the most. And I think those will change our geopolitical landscape. But I also think that we really are looking at a world where efforts to address climate or to try to address climate are going to have their own geopolitical impacts. And so what I mean by that is that over the next 10, 15 or 20 years, a whole variety of actors are going to play different roles in trying to advance the energy transition or trying to stall the energy transition or try to accommodate oneself to the energy transition. And we're all doing this with incomplete information about the future, incomplete information about what other actors are going to do. And I think that it's going to really upend a lot of these traditional relationships. It's going to make some actors more important, other actors less important. I think we're underestimating the geopolitical tumult that is going to come from our efforts to address climate change, not just the actual geopolitical tumult that will result as a result of climate change. So a final question for you, Megan. What lessons of the September 11th era in U.S. foreign policy do you think the U.S. should take into the future? And two part or if I can, what lessons do you think the U.S. will take into the future? Yes, well, you're right to draw the distinction between should and will. I guess there's a large number here. I'll just end with a couple of things. I mean, first I think is this whole question of terrorism. Certainly I think terrorism is going to continue to be with us going back to what we said something earlier in the conversation. Terrorism hasn't been vanquished. It's going to be part of the international landscape. There's still parts of the world where terrorist groups are doing well, are thriving. There could be new places. All of that I think is going to be a reality for policymakers. But I also think that we have come to appreciate it can't be the defining issue of this era. It can't be the defining issue of American foreign policy as it was for so many years. So I think we've come to a better understanding of what is required to address it. Certainly in the United States, we've built up an enormous military, law enforcement, intelligence infrastructure to try to deal not just with terrorism and its manifestations abroad, but also Homeland Security. And I think the challenge there for the United States is how can we make sure that that infrastructure is agile enough to adapt to the changing face of terrorism? Certainly you and your listeners will be aware that recently there have been organizations in the United States that have said, the biggest terrorist threat posed to the United States nowadays is actually not global terrorism, but is domestic terrorism. And there's a lot of truth to that. And so the US is now trying to figure out how it can address domestic terrorism without taking its eye off of international terrorism. In terms of another lesson, I think going back to what I was saying about the forever wars, I was hoping America had been further along in learning this lesson. But to me, an important lesson is how exactly are we going to support and build capacity in countries all around the world without occupying those countries? You often hear that there are dozens of countries around the world that may be potentially compromised, their governments compromised by non-state actors. In every case, the United States and its coalition partners can't go in there and do what it did in Iraq and Afghanistan. We've learned that is not desirable. We've learned that there are so many consequences to that approach. And what we need to have is an alternative approach where we can effectively help countries build capacity and doing that in a way that is sustainable and doesn't require a massive US and coalition footprint. And I thought we had really gone quite a distance in mapping out what that looks like, although I think recent events in Afghanistan make me question it. The last thing I would say just has to do with nation building, it's kind of related to what I was just talking about. But I fear that in the United States, one of the big takeaways of the last 20 years is that the United States doesn't know how to nation build and shouldn't nation build. And I think this is because at the risk of being unpopular everywhere, I think the idea of nation building has gotten a bad rap in the sense that I think people have come to see it as something that's an optional add-on, that's something that was a luxury, when in fact it's really something that was required to ensure that countries like Afghanistan no longer had ungoverned territory. It was a natural follow-up from removing the Taliban. You had to build capacity if you wanted to ensure that there was sufficient stability there that the history didn't repeat itself. I think that people have equated nation building too much with ideological democracy promotion. And there's very little appetite among Americans and certainly among American politicians for what is called nation building. And that's unfortunate because as I suggested, the need to help other countries build capacity, which is not the same thing as helping them realize democratic norms or values or institutions, but just to build capacity to govern, to maintain control over their territory, that need is going to persist for quite a long time. And I hope that the United States and its partners can find a way to learn from the last 20 years, not about whether we should nation build or not, but about what is effective nation building? What are the circumstances under which we can help countries build capacity? What is the sequencing necessary? What are the partnerships we need to build to be effective in building the state capacity? I hope we can delve into that in a way that goes a lot deeper than just dismissing nation building forever wars, a lot of the phrases that had become very common in American political parlance these days. Well, Dr. Megan O'Sullivan, thank you so much for joining me today. We're very grateful for your time. I've learned a lot from your past reflections, your current assessments and your strategic outlook. Thank you, Lydia. It's really been a pleasure to see you and to speak with your viewers. And I'd like to thank Australia for its great partnership with the United States and other coalition members over all these years. And as part of our examination of the September 11th era and the 20th anniversary of the September 11th attacks, I'd encourage you all to go to the Lowy Institute website where you can see the latest Lowy Institute interactive. Did September 11th change our world? It's edited by myself and features essays from a number of notable thinkers, such as Michael Cox, Young Sun, Andrew Bakovic and others. Thank you again, Megan, and thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for joining me today for another Long Distance Lowy Institute event.


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internal revenue service IRS tax news tax time guide electronic tax payment and agreement options available to taxpayers who owe but first an attempt at a joke I apologize in advance I used to be a movie buff but lately I've really let myself go and I don't mean to the movie theater I mean I'm not even in good movie shape these days at least not good new movie shape every movie seems to be some kind of reboot or remake which used to excite me like an interesting new work at machine at the gym I thought it would be the buffest most yokest uppest movie buff ever but after being disappointed so many times to the point I'm convinced movie makers are making crap on purpose just for the thrill of disappointing me like a cruel clown telling a kid they have a super cool surprise only to let them down with some lame mockery of the promised item the cruel clown reveling in the disappointment they created or more accurately and the joy they destroyed now I see every new movie release as just an advertisement to go back and watch the original thankful they have not scrubbed all the media platforms of the old original good stuff as they replace it with the new unoriginal wrecking balls of good stuff oh no they're taking out the good stuff wrecking ball to another classic franchise as I clutch my horribly scratched up old DVDs DVDs I never thought I would ever need anymore as we moved into the age of the Internet they still work however talking to people about movies is a little difficult Star Wars comes up for example I bring up Luke the entire room stares at me Luke that pacifist green alien milk drinking wussy who died from meditating too hard masters of the universe came up one time I mentioned he man and it was informed that he man was so lame he died in the first episode and I was like but wait a second isn't he man the main character of masters of the universe they were like what no he man is some old dude that couldn't hack it so the world got lame and that's where the show starts and I was like wow that's certainly subverted my expectations honestly is this what happened to the prior generations growing up watching cowboy movies only to have later generations thinking every cowboy is like that one dude from ymca I are 2022 dash 63 March 22nd 2022 Washington the Internal Revenue Service today reminded taxpayers who have a tax bill that there are several ways to make payments and there are options for many people who can't pay their tax bill in full by April tax deadline so quick recap on how the IRS wants to be paid so for tax year 2021 for example they want to be paid during 2021 if you do not pay them during 2021 then they pull out that stick and they hit you with it and that's called penalties and interest now most people if you're a W2 employee will experience the payment throughout the year through the withholdings your employer taken the withholdings out of the pay so you never really see the money they just take it out of the pay and then you see it on the W2 and you see it on the pay stubs as well and you report that on the W2 and usually we shoot for we aim for we try to withhold a little bit more than is actually going to be owed not so that you can get a refund necessarily but so that you avoid the stick of penalties and interest in other words if you do not pay during the tax year and you try to pay all at April 15th of the following year or in this case April 18th then you'll get hit the IRS pulls out the stick and starts hitting you with it that's called interest that's called penalties and interest that's what the stick is called they named their stick their stick is named penalties and interest so you might have another kind of payment plan if you're retired or possibly if you have a schedule C type of business and you don't have the withholding situation you might have to make estimated payments now as you make the payments or as you have the withholdings you might be thinking well how does that even work because I have no idea how much my tax will be given the fact that the tax law seems to be changing quite rapidly from year to year my income thresholds have changed quite rapidly and there's so many factors they go into the tax code plus there's a progressive tax system how do I know how much to pay during the year of 2021 with all those factors involved because you would think you'd have to file the tax return given all those factors and then figure out how much you owe in order to figure how much you have to pay well the iris of course wants you to make an estimate so we got to estimate how much we're going to owe and then make the payments during the year trying to overshoot to avoid the stick that the iris is labeled and named penalties and interest that they'll hit you with if you don't if you don't do that so that means that if you owe money by April 18th then you still need to pay it by that point in time even if for example you go on extension you might say well I will go on extension that doesn't extend the time to pay that avoids that other stick of penalties and interest related to the deadline possibly of those kind of those kind of penalties but you still have to pay them on time so many people might get the idea that they're just going to say well I don't I can't make the payment and therefore I'm just not going to file the tax return and you really don't want to do that because note what happens is the iris doesn't really usually whack you with the stick right away they wind up they wind up so you might say hey it's okay I didn't file my taxes I didn't pay anything but then the penalties and interest builds up as the iris kind of winds it winds that stick up and then at some point it will hit you so you don't want to do that you want to set up typically a payment plan of some kind so that's your in compliance and you're minimizing the amount of penalties and interest even if you can't pay the tax at the point in time that the tax return is due that's the general rule so the deadline to submit 2021 tax return or an extension to file and pay tax owed this year falls on April 18th instead of April 15th because of the Emancipation Day holiday in the District of Columbia thank you District of Columbia and your Emancipation holiday gives us all a couple more days that's nice taxpayers in Maine and Massachusetts have until April 19th 2020 hey that's not fair apply to the whole country apply to the okay whatever i'm over it to file their returns due to the Patriots Day holiday to those states some taxpayers who were victims of a natural disaster there's a link to that here have even longer to file their returns the iris reminds people to timely file their tax returns and pay whatever they can by the filing deadline to avoid late filing and interest penalties that's what they named their stick they got their stick and they put it they put a name on it they burned the name into the into the wood sign sign in to pay and see payment history taxpayers can use their online account so you can log into your online account i recommend doing that because i think it's going to become more and more relevant going forward they took away the face identification kind of thing that seemed kind of weird that they needed that i'm i i tried to use it was hard but they took that away to securely see important information when preparing to file their tax return or following up on balances or notices taxpayers can make a same-day payment for a 2021 tax return balance on extension to file or estimate of taxes which are all due by april deadline for most taxpayers they can also view their adjusted gross income economic impact payment amounts and advanced child tax credit payment amounts needed for their 2021 return so all that stuff these prepayment things which is the iris's new thing that's their new go-to cool tool uh you got it you could find those if you log into your website that can help you out to fix the return and file the return properly which you want to do because if you don't it might go into the processing pile which is infinitely long or something like almost infinite for all practical purposes at that point which could delay the tax return so payment history and any schedule of pending payments you can see that payment plan details will be there so if you want to set up your payment plan you can do it kind of automatically you don't have to talk to anyone or anything you won't be able to talk to anyone most likely if you try to call them or something but you could typically set it up still pretty easily on the iris website or something like that possibly in your account digital copies of select notices from the irs can also be seen in your account so ways to pay electronic fund withholding so we got the good old efw this option allows taxpayers to file and pay electronically from their bank account when using tax preparation software or a tax professional this option is free and only available when electronically filing a tax return we got the direct pay direct pay there's a link to these pay items by the way direct pay is a free and allows taxpayers to securely pay their federal taxes directly from their check-in or savings account without any fees or free registration taxpayers can schedule payments up to 365 days in advance after submitting a payment through direct pay taxpayers will receive immediate confirmation that's nice i like confirmation to happen immediately right away electronic federal tax payment system we got this option this free service gives taxpayers a safe and convenient way to pay individual and business taxes by phone or online so you could do it even by the phone on that one and i mean like actually calling by phone like not by phone and online like using the phone as a computer i mean using the phone like like the phones used to be so enroll for more information taxpayers can call<PHONE_NUMBER> or visit the efts.gov website there's links to that here credit card debit card or digital wallet you can pay with the digital wallet even these days individuals do you have to tell the irs and they put you on the list if you pay with a digital wallet i wonder i think you do i would think but any case individuals can pay online by phone or with a mobile device through any of the authorized payment processors the processor charges a fee the irs doesn't receive any fees for these payments authorized card processors and phone numbers are available on irs.gov forward slash payment i think the digital wallet they don't mean like bitcoin i don't think or anything like that i think i do they mean like a paypal or something i haven't paid for the digital wallet so i don't know but if that's the way you want to pay you can look into it i don't have any experience with that i'm just reporting i'm just reporting what i'm seeing here cash for taxpayers who prefer to pay in cash this is weird you can pay in cash i mean maybe that's beneficial for some people i kind of feel like it's made for drug dealers or something you know like why would you pay it seems kind of weird but maybe it's maybe it's a good thing you can pay in cash if you want to and like usually you would want an audit trail so normally i would say you probably that's probably not the best way to pay but if that's what you got you got cash under that mattress in the riverbank maybe the best place to have it these days with the whole inflation thing and you know all that stuff but in any case the irs offers a way to pay taxes at one of its cash processing companies at participating paying retail stores the irs urges taxpayers choosing this option to start early because it involves a four step process four step process details including answers to frequently asked questions are at irs.gov forward slash pay with cash there's a link to that here check or money order payments made by check or notice they put this one at the bottom they don't they don't want to get a check because that means a physical thing has a physical person needs to open the check so again from a payment standpoint that might be a good thing actually you might say hey if you if you don't have anyone over there to open my check as long as you don't hit me with your stick of penalties and interest and you don't cash the check for the next 30 years until you get things under control over there that's okay but you know i kind of like to see the payment processed anyways just to get confirmation in case they lose it or something so payments made by check or money orders should be made payable to the quote united states treasury in quote to help ensure that the payment gets credited um promptly taxpayers should also enclose a form 1040 v that's the voucher payment voucher and print on the front of the check or money order quote 2021 form 1040 you got to make sure that they apply to the right year because it's quite possible if you don't do that they applied to like 2022 or something like that and then or they apply to the prior year maybe and then they send it back to you and then they charge you penalties and interest because you didn't pay them but you did pay them they just applied it to the wrong period so make sure whatever payment methods you're using digital or actual physical check you properly label where and what year you want the payment to be applied to so you need the name address time phone number social security so filed by april 18 2022 most taxpayers the most important thing everyone with a with a tax bill should do is file a return by april 18 do date for most taxpayers even if they can't pay in full so even if you can't pay you want to file the tax return and you want to try to estimate how much money you owe so you can still put yourself on extension that's okay but that doesn't wipe out the fact that the iris wants their money by that point in time so if you owe them money you want to pay them you want to pay them to avoid the stick the penalties and interest of course taxpayers may also request a six month extension to file by october 17 2022 to avoid penalties and interest for failing to file on time though automatic tax filing extensions are available to anyone who wants one these extensions don't change the payment deadline so be careful with that there's two different sticks there's two different sticks they got a lot of sticks over there they picked the one that they want to hit you with so there's two different ones you got penalties related to the filing on time and penalties related to payment on time so keep those separate in your mind so it is not an extension to pay visit irs.gov forward slash extensions for details there's a link to that here usually anyone who owes tax and waits until after that date to file will be charged a late filing penalty of five percent per month so if a tax return is complete filing it by april 18 is always less costly even if the full amount due can't be paid on time irs free file is an easy quick way to file that is available to eligible individuals and families who earned seventy three thousand dollars or less so you got that free file option there's a link to the irs free file here you can find it on the irs website irs.gov of course pay what you can so if you can't pay the the general rules you want to pay what you can so what are you trying to do if you can't pay the tax you know you owe money you can't pay it you want to make sure that you're still in compliance because if you're not the irs is likely to hit you with with the sticks and you want to pay as much as you can typically because even if you're in compliance by setting up a payment plan you you're still going to be charged some interest on in possibly some penalties and then you want to set up a payment plan that that helps you to be in compliance and once again lowers the number of penalties and interest which is the goal so interest plus the late payment penalties will apply to any payments made after april 18th making a payment even a partial payment will help limit penalties and interest charges the fastest and easiest way to pay a personal tax bill is with direct pay available only on irs.gov for a rundown of other payment options visit irs.gov forward slash payments there's a link to that here the irs urges taxpayers to first consider other options for payment including getting a loan to pay the amount due in many cases loan costs may be lower than the combination of interest and penalties the irs must charge under the federal law so you might say hey if they're going to charge me penalties and interest maybe i'll just take out a loan and then i'll pay it off with the loan and then i'll pay back the loan which i got to pay interest on but possibly it's going to be less than the penalties and interest charged by the irs possible could be happy so normally the the late payment penalty is one half of one percent point five percent per month that is the interest rate adjusted quarterly is currently three percent per month compounded daily if a loan isn't possible the irs can often help online payment plans most individual taxpayers qualify to set up an online payment plan with the irs and it is only takes a few minutes to apply so you can do it online you don't got to talk to anyone or anything like that about the fact that you you know like you don't want to pay if you can't pay the tax bill or anything you should be able to do it automatically so make sure to be proactive and do that so that you avoid the sticks the sticks not the sticks applicants are notified immediately if the request is approved no need to call or write to the irs the irs notes that online payment plans are processed more quickly than request submitted with electronically filed tax returns if a taxpayer just filed their return and knows that they'll owe a balance they may be able to set up a payment plan online before they even receive a notice or bill there are two main types of online payment plans you should be aware of there's a short-term payment plan the payment period is 180 days or less and the total amount owed is less than 100,000 in combined tax penalties and interest there's no fee for setting one up though interest and late payment penalty continue to accrue and then there's the long payment plan payments are made monthly and the payment owed must be less than $50,000 in combined tax penalties and interest if the irs approves a long payment plan also known as an installment agreement a setup fee normally applies so there's a link to the setup fees you got to make a payment to set up the plan but low-income taxpayers may qualify to have the fee waived or reimbursed so if you're a low-income taxpayer you might be able to look into further how to waive the setup fee in addition for anyone who filed their return on time the late payment penalty rate is cut in half while an installment agreement is in effect this means that the penalty accrues at the rate of one quarter of one percent or point two five percent per month instead of the usual one half of one percent or point five percent per month taxpayers who do not qualify for an online payment agreement may still be able to arrange to pay in installments see additional information on payment plans for more information other payment options some struggling taxpayers may also consider using these other payment options we got the delayed collection if the irs determines a taxpayer is unable to pay it may delay collection until their financial condition improves however the total amount owed will still increase because penalties and interest and charged until paid in full taxpayers can request a delay by calling the phone number on their notice or<PHONE_NUMBER> then we have the penalty relief some taxpayers qualify to have their late filing or late payment penalties reduced or eliminated so if you get the payment and penalties sometimes you might it's like kind of like calling the credit card company and being like hey come on this is the first time i've ever had a problem waive the penalty for me would you and something like that and you can do you could do that sometime if you're in good standing with the irs possibly you may be able to do that this can be done in a case by case basis based on reasonable cause so there's a pretty vague term i have reasonable cause to eliminate these these penalties and interest please would you remove them alternatively where a taxpayer has a history of compliance the irs can typically provide relief under the first time abatement program so notice of course they're trying to keep people in compliance so if you are in compliance they're more likely to to waive penalties and interest or something like that in a first time abatement type of program kind of situation similar to the credit card situation if you pay your credit card on time and everything and you get a late payment one time or something like that they're willing to work with you oftentimes but if you do it all the time they're like no i don't think so because i don't trust you i don't trust you visit irs.gov forward slash penalty relief for details there's a link to that then you got the offer and compromise some taxpayers qualify to settle their tax bill for less than the full amount due through a offer and compromise though there is typically a $205 non-refundable application fee it is generally waived for low income taxpayers and for offers based on a doubt as to liability the offer and compromise pre-qualifier tool there's a link to that here can help determine eligibility for for anyone interested in applying now note that the offer and compromise is one of those types of things that you see advertisements for and whatnot for people saying hey we'll lower your tax bill if your tax bill is over 10 000 or whatever 15 whatever they say then we can lower the tax bill usually they're talking about kind of a copper offer and compromise or that's the main tool that they're kind of alluding to so just realize that that you want to make sure that you're going to a legitimate place if you're seeking help with an offer and compromise and because a lot of times you go to it like an advertisement these these commercials might just be an advertisement not even a really a firm that then allocates you to a firm which means you don't know exactly who you're you're working with so you want to make sure that that to be aware of that and also you can get a pretty good jump on whether or not you would qualify for the offer and compromise because it's all basically laid out in in the code so you can read up on it yourself and whatever and everything and clearly the idea would be similar to an idea between a bank lending money and the individual if the individual can't pay back the money then the bank would be incentivized to lower the amount that is going to be paid would be the general idea because they're not going to get the money anyways and you got the similar kind of thing here so you would under you would think what would the what would the government want in order to give an offer and compromise they want a personal basically income statement and balance sheet they want to know how much stuff you have how much you are taking in to determine whether or not you should qualify for for an offer and compromise possibly lowering the tax bill due to the fact that you're not going to be able to pay the tax bill which would be beneficial then to lower it on both sides of the transaction on the payer side and the recipient side so the IRS reminds taxpayers that they have rights and protections through the collection process for details see taxpayer bill of rights and publication one for rights as taxpayers for more information about payments the topic number 202 tax payment options on irs.gov taxpayers should know before they owe the irs encourages all taxpayers to check their withholding with the irs the tax withholding estimator this news release is part of a series called the tax time guide a resource that helps taxpayers file an accurate tax return additional help is available in publication 17 for federal income tax there's a link to all this wonderful stuff here and there'll be a link to this in the description


Our topic of discussion today is, can an older woman get married or rather be in a relationship with a younger man for it to work?  If we had a man, we would probably ask the men as well. But what do you guys think? Can a relationship with a younger man work? If you're younger than me by like five, six years, I feel like I would not look at you as my equal first of all and I would be looking at you like a child. Talking to a guy because he was born in September and I was born in May. So that means it was, oh my God. He was like three months younger than me and I was like no, I cannot. So for me, I don't know why I feel protected and I feel such a strong masculine energy when the guy is older than me. I've interacted with people who are way older than me and I feel like no, no, no, no, no. The emotional maturity is on the low end, you know, and I've interacted with other people who are younger, other men who are younger than me whom I feel actually think straightforward than the older ones. So I feel like age really doesn't come with maturity. No, it does not. You are watching Friends Vibe. All feelings are represented. Now, the topic of discussion today is can an older woman get married or rather be in a relationship with a younger man for it to work?  If we had a man, we would probably ask the men as well. But what do you guys think? Can a relationship with a younger man work? Younger by what age? Depends. Younger is younger. You know, even one month is younger. Sometimes it can, but the age difference doesn't have to be that much because I believe for women, we mature faster, right? Yeah. So imagine you are 35, you're dating a man who's 24. Honestly, first of all, let me speak for myself. If I was dating someone who is way younger than me, I would lose some respect for you. Let me say personally. So I don't think it will work. Younger with you is so many years old, kid or whatever. Because right now I'm in a relationship that someone is younger than me by one year. But if you're younger than me by like five, six years, I feel like I would not look at you as my equal, first of all. And I would be looking at you like a child. For me, I feel like it's a deal breaker for me. I've once stopped talking to a guy because he was born in September and I was born in May, so that means he was, oh my God. He was like three months younger than me and I was like, no, I cannot. So for me, I don't know why I feel protected and I feel such a strong masculine energy when the guy is older than me. So I would definitely prefer to be with someone who is older than me. Okay. Personally, I feel like age for me is not quite an issue, but the age difference is an issue. Like if it's big age group, age group is okay for me. I would date someone who is in the same age group as me because again, they say age really doesn't come with maturity. Sometimes age comes alone. And it's quite unfortunate because I feel like being brought up, we were told you should marry someone who is way older than you. That's why they are able to protect you or to be available emotionally to you. But I've interacted with people who are way older than me and I feel like, no, no, no, no. Their emotional maturity is on the low end and I've interacted with other people who are younger, other men who are younger than me whom I feel actually think straightforward than the older ones. Yeah, true. So I feel like age really doesn't come with maturity. No, it does not. Yeah. So what age group do we think that... I mean, for Lisa, I said age is you have to be older. It's a factor.  Actually, no, it's not even about maturity. Any advice from older people? By older people, I don't mean by their age difference of 15 years, 20 years, 20 years. I would prefer 10 years or less. Then something else, like for me, especially this feeling became so strong when I was in campus. When I was in campus, I was juggling school and work and I was feeling people my age or people in the same class with Kasi Likwa, you know, and me, I'm just out there like working. So I've never really met someone who's like really young, young, young, but I've met someone who is maybe younger than me, two years younger than me, and we are never on the same page. But I do agree. There are some people who may be older than me but they're childish. Yeah, so I think it depends, but I would prefer someone who is older than me. Yeah. The age group, the age group, I feel like, yeah, the age group thing have to also date someone who's in your age group because you can't be 35 and you're dating someone. Let me say my age right now, 25, and I'm dating someone who's like 21. Come on now. We will not be on the same page every single time because I feel like his brain is trying to mature. Trying? He's in school. Yeah, he's in school. And I'm here. I'm working.  He will get there, but not now. So obviously, Takwana, Nakosana right now, I feel like this boy is just... But now I feel there's a difference between when one is 25 and another one is 21 and one is 35 and another one is... Most of them, yeah. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, so I feel the age group thing, yeah, you have to date someone who's in your age group. You get 35-year-old mid-30s. Yes. 30-year-old early 30s. You get 30-year-old mid-30s. So obviously, there's conflict there. I feel that makes much more sense than 25 and 21. Yes, yes it does. And also, you see also, when it comes to actually thinking of an older man, when they are way older, then they are more experienced. They have... You have less experience as them, so you might also not be on the same page. So I really... Personally, I feel like age group is really important, whether they are younger or way older. You have to be on the same page. On the same page. In the same age group. Yeah, yeah. Then another danger of, you know, dating someone who is younger than you is maybe less ex... Less past. Because you see, if you date someone who is way older than you, they have a lot of past. And baggage. And baggage with them, you know. They could probably come with kids. Be divorced. Be ready for the kids. They could come with divorce. Are you ready to get to a relationship with someone who has been divorced? Baby mama drama. Baby mama drama as well. So they come with less past for sure. So of course, there's always an disadvantage and advantage of something. What are some of the advantages of dating someone who is younger? And in this younger, we mean same age group. Not like way younger. No, no, no. Same age group. For me, I feel like when you date someone, I mean, same age group, you're on the same page. Exactly. You are on the same page. More likely. And no one is belittling the other when it comes to probably achievements. True. Because I mean, the younger people were really achieved, you know. But again, they understand and I didn't achieve this because of my age. I achieved this because I did one, two, three. So you're probably on the same page. Then again, when you date someone who is younger, you're likely to enjoy the same activities and the same things. Yes, you are. And I mean, I feel like that's, that's what is fun. See, I mean, imagine like trying to hike with your 70-year-old boyfriend. Trying to hike with your 70-year-old boyfriend. Imagine. It's not really possible. You know, as much as there are people who enjoy, you know, and like to date way older people, but they have their reasons. But I feel like if you really want to enjoy your marriage or your relationship, you need to be in the same age group. True, true, true. So what are you guys, what are your final words or final thoughts on, you know, where women dating younger men? Because you've seen someone like Zary, Zary Hassan is dating Shaqib and Shaqib is like 30, Zary is 40. That's a 10-year gap. And she always says that this is a grown-up.  He's not a child. But you know that's because, like you said, according to us as a woman, you're supposed to get someone who's way older than you for the protection part, for taking care of you in terms of financial, because maybe he will be way ahead of you and all that. Yes. But in this day and age, 18-year-old are getting money way more than 35-year-olds. Very true. So it's not really about that and also being protected. They are, how do I say, they are men who are older or women who are older and really they are not doing anything for themselves. Yeah. So things have changed. It really doesn't have to be a T.O. I'm dating. We are dating. We are dating. I have to date someone who's older than me. You get. So as long as, first of all, as long as you both love each other and there is a bit of maturity, not a bit, there's maturity on both parties. So you both have the same kind of goals. You have, you get along well. You're compatible. You're well compatible with each other. It's a bit of a thing to do. Yeah. Liz, your final thoughts. Well, I feel to each their own, but definitely same age group makes sense. But anything plus or minus five years may be tricky, especially, I don't know, that's just what I feel. Unless, but I keep on saying, there's a difference between 25 and 21, 35 and 31. Yeah. Yeah. There's a very big difference. I think in the 30s, plus or minus five is okay. But below 25, it is not, because you cannot be 16 dating someone who is 23. Oh, you're 21 dating someone who is 20. You can, but sometimes it may be difficult. Yeah. Okay. Personally, I feel like if you wish to date a younger man, it's okay. As long as the emotional maturity is on the same level, because if your emotional maturity is not on the same level, there is going to be problems. Yeah. And number two, if it's in the same age group, your priorities are right. You're together. You're thinking the same thing. So it's okay. I feel like at the same age group, there is really nothing that could make a relationship not work. As long as both of you are committed and you're willing to be together, no one is belittling the other because of age, matters and all that. But I mean, if the emotional maturity is there and you both of you love each other, then it can work. So go for your younger man. I mean, I feel like people really are afraid of being judged by the society. Yeah. But the problem also comes when, as an older woman, I am providing for you. Okay. That's tricky. Yeah. I'll start looking at you like my child and I'll start treating you like my child. Yeah. You get. So there will be no respect. But that's why, like you said, age group. Yeah. But I feel like women are just, you know, because men are born providers, even for the man that is not providing, they might feel like they are. There's already securities. Yeah. So is Shakip providing for Zare? Of course not. Of course not. Maybe it's just love. You know, you know, love can, love can do things for sure. It's not really enough. It's not really enough in this day. It's not enough for sure. Yeah. It's not enough. I mean, those are very important. Yeah. Especially if you're dating someone for long term. Yeah. I mean for marriage. Yeah. Obviously, I do not expect to just be providing the whole, the entire time. It's a shocker. But I think Shakip is married. Shakip is married. Yes. He probably doesn't really have as much money as Zare. But he's married. That's also good. Yeah, come with your money. Don't let, yeah. If the problem comes when I'm fully providing for you, then up on Nio. Yeah. It's a bit tricky. Yeah. All right guys. Let us know down on the comment section if you're a woman, would you date someone who is older than you? And if yes, at what age do you think Nana, that cannot work? Make sure to leave a comment but also subscribe to SPM bars. That was a French vibe. Until next time, it's goodbye from us.