The most worrisome thing about the vulnerability of the U.S economy circa 2008 is the extent of official understatement and misstatement – the preference for minimizing how many problems there are and how interconnected they are. – Kevin Phillips, Bad Money (2008)

Iran: Diplomacy over War: More Loosening Steps- clearly a different atmospheric. Some are skeptical, and the British press has been more optimistic than elsewhere. But a pre-embassy being staffed… that’s a notable step, beyond the limited function that the U.S. representative to talks was to assume.

The US plans to establish a diplomatic presence in Tehran for the first time in 30 years as part of a remarkable turnaround in policy by President George Bush.

The Guardian has learned that an announcement will be made in the next month to establish a US interests section -- a halfway house to setting up a full embassy. . . .

The creation of a US interest section would see diplomats stationed in Tehran for the first time since the hostage crisis that began when hundreds of students, as part of the Iranian revolution that led to fall of the Shah, stormed the US embassy in 1979 and held the occupants until 1981." http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/17/usa.iran

After years of escalating tensions and bloodshed, the talk in the Middle East is suddenly about talking. The shift is still relatively subtle, but hints of a new approach in the waning months of the Bush administration are fueling hopes of at least short-term stability for the first time since the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Much is happening, adding up not to any great diplomatic breakthrough, but to a distinct change in direction. Syria is being welcomed out of isolation by Europe and is holding indirect talks with Israel. Lebanon has formed a new government. Israel has cut deals with Hamas (a cease-fire) and Hezbollah (a prisoner exchange).

On Wednesday, the United States agreed to send a high-ranking diplomat to attend talks with Iran over its nuclear program, and was considering establishing a diplomatic presence in Tehran for the first time since the 1979 revolution and hostage crisis.

“The overall picture is moving in the direction of cooling the political atmosphere,” said Muhammad al-Rumaihi, a former government adviser in Kuwait and the editor of Awan, an independent daily newspaper there. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/18/world/middleeast/18mideast.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

Condi’s Victory?

Condoleezza Rice was George Bush's handmaiden for the war in Iraq but she is now emerging as the best hope for avoiding a military conflict between the United States and Iran.

The Secretary of State, who is one of the few people with the President's ear, has shown the door to Vice-President Dick Cheney's cabal of war-hungry advisers. Ms Rice was able to declare yesterday that the administration's decision to break with past policy proves that there is international unity in opposing Iran's nuclear programme. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/condis-coup-how-the-neocons-lost-the-argument-over-iran-870861.html

Torture: Terror and the VP We've been so reluctant to confirm that Cheney has run the show- from the outset. Jane Mayer’s piece adds another voice to the consensus.

The big argument being made by the vice president, his lawyer, David Addington, and the Justice Department was that the commander-and-chief needed almost unfettered powers to win the war on terror. And yet when you really examine the record, it's frequently not the president who's making many of these calls; it's the vice president," she said.

The president, it's funny, I asked a lot of questions about him when I was doing interviews, and he keeps disappearing from the frame of the picture. He is described as distracted by one of the people who briefed him. Colin Powell tells a friend who I interviewed he sees the president not as being stupid but as being too easily manipulated by Cheney, who knew how to push him around." http://www.propublica.org/article/talking-with-jane-mayer-715/

Feith before Congress: Still another appearance by an Administration official...and barely a glove landed.

Feith, the former undersecretary of defense for policy, testified that he was an ardent proponent of the Geneva Conventions, even though he approved of interrogation policies that no international lawyer has ever argued complies with Geneva protections. These 'enhanced interrogation techniques' included 20-hour questioning sessions; the physical contortion regimen known as 'stress positions'; the use of dogs for interrogations; removing a detainee's clothing, and exploiting detainees' fears. He claimed that official administration policy was that detainees should never be tortured. . . .

The panel chairman, Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), expressed skepticism that acts like stripping a detainee's clothing off could ever fail to qualify as inhumane. 'I imagine one could apply these things in an inhumane fashion,' Feith replied. 'Removal of clothing" is different from "naked." . . . It could be done in a humane way.”

Feith conceded that detainees in U.S. custody had been tortured and, in some cases, murdered, but denied that there was any connection between that behavior and official policy. “Some people do bad things,” he said. http://www.washingtonindependent.com/view/former-defense

Dahlia Lithwick comments:

Feith makes short work of the committee with the standard-issue Bush administration ploy of blaming others. He is quick to say it was 'lawyers in charge' who ultimately opposed applying Common Article 3 at Gitmo. He goes to great lengths to emphasize that the request for harsher interrogation techniques came up from the U.S. Southern Command and not from the top down. He testifies that he relied on Jim Haynes--Rumsfeld's general counsel--for legal conclusions because he was just a 'policy official.' http://www.slate.com/id/2195383/

Impeachment (sort of) A hearing to lay out the misdeeds:

Rep. Dennis Kucinich's single impeachment article will get a committee hearing -- but not on removing President Bush from office.

The House on Tuesday voted 238-180 to send his article of impeachment -- for Bush's reasoning for taking the country to war in Iraq -- to the Judiciary Committee, which buried Kucinich's previous effort.

This time, the panel will open hearings. But House Democratic leaders emphatically said the proceedings will not be about Bush's impeachment, a first step in the Constitution's process of a removing a president from office.

Instead, the panel will conduct an election-year review -- possibly televised -- of anything Democrats consider to be Bush's abuse of power. Kucinich, D-Ohio, is likely to testify. But so will several scholars and administration critics, Democrats said. http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iE21FOVAfMfEbAE5LDwiYm8fGh4QD91UJD6O1

Economy: Will anyone- including Obama- declare this to be ‘the failure of Reaganonomics? Bush gets some blame, speculators get a share, but mainstream folk avoid broaching that this almost thirty year exaltation of finance, the free market, deregulation, privatization?

Merrill Lynch reported a $4.65 billion loss during its second quarter yesterday, surpassing the expectations of the most pessimistic analysts and underscoring the continued toll of the subprime mortgage meltdown even as economists and policymakers turn their attention to other economic threats such as inflation.

It is the fourth consecutive quarter in the red for Merrill, the nation's third-largest investment bank, and the firm has now piled up $19 billion in losses over the past year because of the credit crisis and its exposure to the troubled mortgage industry.

Merrill's losses continue despite upbeat comments earlier this year by chief executive John Thain, who was quoted in the Wall Street Journal in January as saying that the credit crisis was "for the most part behind us." In April, after Merrill reported a $2 billion loss in the first quarter, Thain maintained that optimism, saying the firm had sufficient capital for "the foreseeable future" and would not have to raise more money from the equity markets. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/17/AR2008071700083_pf.html

CAMPAIGN: Obama’s still raising the big bucks, heading overseas accompanied by network anchors and much other media; McCain whines: it is hard, as Clinton found out last winter, to no longer be ‘teacher’s’ pet, though they continue to protect him by not reporting on the his changed positions (taxes, immigration, Afghanistan, torture, etc.) or innumerable flubs (below)

The extraordinary coverage of Obama's trip reflects how the candidate remains an object of fascination in the news media, a built-in feature of being the first African-American presidential nominee for a major political party and a relative newcomer to the national stage.

But the coverage also feeds into concerns in McCain's campaign, and among Republicans in general, that the media is imbalanced in their coverage of the candidates, just as aides to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton felt during the primary season.

"It is unproductive to spend it worrying about the way Obama is covered," said Jill Hazelbaker, a spokeswoman for McCain. "That being said, it certainly hasn't escaped us that the three network newscasts will originate from stops on Obama's trip next week." http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/07/17/america/17anchors.php

Social Security and McCain: The media avoid: Realizing that their advantage with the press still hasn’t adequately paid off, the McCain campaign is complaining more about unequal treatment. Yet, the candidate’s ongoing flubs, demonstrations of ignorance, misplaced humor all get short shrift. I thought his trashing of Social Security was especially over the top, surpassing Bush for political stupidity. McCain appears to believe that the very design of Social Security is the problem. Absolutely stunning. As I’ve noted, the Obama campaign should run his ‘Social Security is a disgrace’ comment on a loop, especially in Florida, until November 4.

Yet, the media have all but ignored it, favoring instead the Jesse Jackson neutering comment.

Eric Boehlert:

By contrast, McCain said at a campaign appearance in Denver on July 7 that the Social Security system as structured in America, in which younger people pay taxes to support the benefits of retirees, is an "absolute disgrace" -- but his proclamation was mostly passed over as being irrelevant. The disconnect between the coverage was astounding. As of Sunday morning, only 17 major metropolitan newspapers in America had reported on McCain's "disgraceful" remark, in a total of 20 articles and columns, according to search of Nexis.

By contrast, more than 50 major U.S. dailies published a total of 126 articles and columns about the Jackson story. Several influential newspapers went back to the story ad nauseam. Combined, the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun-Times and Los Angeles Times published 39 different articles and columns that referenced the Jackson-Obama controversy.

By contrast, the combined number of stories and columns those three newspapers published that made reference to the McCain "disgrace" controversy? One.
On television, the disparity was even more striking. Again, as ofhttp://mediamatters.org/columns/200807150002

Humor:

Jay Leno: Reflecting a current media frame…

"The latest polls show Barack Obama and John McCain are dead even. Dead even. See, what happened was, Obama moved to the right and McCain moved to the left and they became the same person." http://mail.google.com/mail/#inbox/11b30d9dc98c6127

Stephen Colbert:

“For far too long the president has been forced to do a terrible job of pretending to care what people think of him. But not anymore, folks," These last 180 days this dog is going to go out barking. It is going to be so sweet when he pops by the World Court in the Hague and screams: 'Adios, from waterboard central! Then he can drop by the stock exchange, ring the bell, and scream: 'Goodbye from the world's weakest currency!' And then he can head over to Iraq, and as he's leaving, shout, 'I break it, you bought it! And, finally he can swing by the Lower 9^th ward in New Orleans…oh, am I kdding? He’ll never go there again…" http://www.comedycentral.com/colbertreport/videos.jhtml?videoId=176342

-R

The way to get out of Iraq is to get out of Iraq. – Juan Cole

Afghanistan: Obama is one of many to have long made the point of invading Iraq was ‘not the central front of the war on terrorism’ and thus we need to move out of Iraq and into Afghanistan. But, does anyone remember the Soviet experience? Is occupying Afghanistan any more feasible/advisable than doing such in Iraq?

Juan Cole shares his discomfort with this notion:

If the Afghanistan gambit is sincere, I don't think it is good geostrategy. Afghanistan is far more unwinnable even than Iraq. If playing it up is politics, then it is dangerous politics. Presidents can become captive of their own record and end up having to commit to things because they made strong representations about them to the public.

....Afghan tribes are fractious. They feud. Their territory is vast and rugged, and they know it like the back of their hands. Afghans are Jeffersonians in the sense that they want a light touch from the central government, and heavy handedness drives them into rebellion. Stand up Karzai's army and air force and give him some billions to bribe the tribal chiefs, and let him apply carrot and stick himself.

We need to get out of there. "Al-Qaeda" was always Bin Laden's hype. He wanted to get us on the ground there so that the Mujahideen could bleed us the way they did the Soviets. It is a trap.

Beware.

Torture: Long in the making:

A CIA analyst warned the Bush administration in 2002 that up to a third of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay may have been imprisoned by mistake, but White House officials ignored the finding and insisted that all were 'enemy combatants' subject to indefinite incarceration, according to a new book critical of the administration's terrorism policies.

The CIA assessment directly challenged the administration's claim that the detainees were all hardened terrorists -- the 'worst of the worst,' as then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said at the time. But a top aide to Vice President Cheney shrugged off the report and squashed proposals for a quick review of the detainees' cases, author Jane Mayer writes in 'The Dark Side,' scheduled for release next week.

"There will be no review,” the book quotes Cheney staff director David Addington as saying. “The president has determined that they are ALL enemy combatants. We are not going to revisit it. " http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/11/AR2008071102954.html

Mayer Book: Did "enhanced" CIA interrogations save lives? [No]

President Bush has repeatedly defended the need to use 'enhanced interrogations' in order to get life-saving intelligence, and has pointed to Abu Zubayda's case as an example. I went over the claims in this case carefully, and found them highly dubious. Bush claimed three breakthroughs from coercive tactics used on Abu Zubayda.

First, he said, Abu Zubayda told the CIA that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was the terrorist behind the 9/11 plot. But, if one reads the 9/11 Commission's detailed report on what information had reached the CIA prior to the 9/11 attacks, it is clear that the CIA already had this information.

Second, President Bush said that Abu Zubayda revealed that an American-born Al Qaeda figure was on his way to attack America. This is widely understood to be a reference to Jose Padilla. But numerous published accounts indicate that Abu Zubayda gave this information to interrogators prior to being physically coerced. So it's not accurate to describe it as an argument for coercion.

Third, the President said Abu Zubayda gave up information leading to the capture of another top Al Qaeda terrorist, Ramsi Bin Al Shibh. But circumstantial evidence, as well as previously published accounts, suggest that Bin Al Shibh was more likely located by the United States as the result of an interview he gave to Al Jazeera.

Meanwhile, although President Bush has argued that 'enhanced' interrogation had led to numerous breakthroughs he has never publicly acknowledged the false and fabricated intelligence it has yielded, too. One former top CIA official told me, 'Ninety percent of what we got was crap.'" http://harpers.org/archive/2008/07/hbc-90003234

Prosecuting Bush: Vincent Bugliosi: His book on how to try Bush has been ignored by reviewers and the talk-show circuit… consistent with impeachment being forever ‘off the table.’

Mr. Bugliosi, in a recent telephone interview from his home in Los Angeles, said he had expected some resistance from the mainstream media because of the subject matter - the book lays a legal case for holding President Bush 'criminally responsible' for the deaths of American soldiers in Iraq - but not a virtual blackout...

The editor of Newsweek, Jon Meacham, said he had not read the manuscript, but he offered a reason why the media might be silent: “I think there's a kind of Bush-bashing fatigue out there." http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/07/business/media/07bugliosi.html?scp=1&sq=Vincent+Bugliosi&st=nyt

Iraq: Doling out the Dollars: We and Maliki: $750 Billion, heading for trillions. And, al-Maliki has cash to spare.

The handouts by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and a handful of other top officials are authorized- as long as each goes no higher than about $8,000, and the same people don't get them twice. Aides say they are meant merely to ease the pain a bit, and are motivated by a belief that better conditions will lead to more security.

…The United States has been doling out cash itself, most effectively to former Sunni militants who switched sides to fight al-Qaida. The military has also provided money and assistance to projects like fixing damaged roads in the Shiite enclave of Sadr City after battles there.

Yet most recent big spending announcements have been Iraqi: $100 million to rebuild Sadr City; another $100 million to the Shiite city of Basra after fighting there; $100 million for another southern Shiite town, Amarah; and $83 million to help internal refugees return home.

It's unclear how fast the project money will actually get out. Past U.S. surveys have found Iraqi officials actually spent only tiny portions of the money they had allocated, often because of disorganization in government offices or a lack of technical know-how. http://ph.news.yahoo.com/ap/20080713/tap-iraq-money-as-weapon-d3b07b8.html

Our Embedded Media: The Tillman Example The Associated Press has been especially partisan in recent weeks, reaching a new low in journalism standards.

Buried in the 50-page report on Pat Tillman and Jessica Lynch released today by the House Oversight Committee, is a priceless quote from none other than the new head of the AP's Washington Bureau, Ron Fournier.

Straight from page 21 of the report:

Karl Rove exchanged e-mails about Pat Tillman with Associated Press reporter Ron Fournier, under the subject line "H-E-R-O." In response to Mr. Fournier's e-mail, Mr. Rove asked, "How does our country continue to produce men and women like this," to which Mr. Fournier replied, "The Lord creates men and women like this all over the world. But only the great and free countries allow them to flourish. Keep up the fight." http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/203927.php

Inflation: How High? A striking jump, not only emanating from oil prices

Soaring costs for gasoline and food pushed inflation at the wholesale level up by a larger-than-expected amount in June, leaving inflation rising over the past year at the fastest pace in more than a quarter-century.

The Labor Department reported that wholesale prices jumped by 1.8 percent last month, the biggest one-month rise since last November. Over the past 12 months, wholesale prices are up 9.2 percent, the largest year-over-year surge since June 1981, another period when soaring energy costs were giving the country inflation pains.

Outside Washington, there was plenty more bad news. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrials closed below 11,000 for the first time in two years, and shares of troubled mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac tumbled again. Fannie shed 27.3 percent and Freddie lost 26 percent.

In Los Angeles, police had to order people lined up outside an IndyMac Bank branch to remain calm or face arrest as they tried to pull out their money on the second day of the failed institution's federal takeover.

An analyst downgraded Wachovia Corp. and said the outlook for its shareholders is "bleak." Its already-battered stock sank about 7.7 percent further, to $9.08. U.S. Bancorp posted an 18 percent drop in second-quarter profit and tripled its provision for credit losses.

General Motors said Tuesday it plans to lay off salaried workers, cut truck production and suspend its stock dividend, all in an effort to raise $15 billion to help turn around its North American operations.

The dollar hit a new low against the euro. And even good news came with a dark side: Oil prices fell by more than $6 per barrel — the biggest single-day drop in 17 years — as traders fretted that the slowing U.S. economy would dampen demand for crude.

"The country is in a bad spot right now, squeezed by high and accelerating inflation and a very weak economy and struggling to overcome a very severe financial shock," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/5965849/for/cnbc/

A sense of economic gloom gripped Washington on Tuesday as President Bush urged Americans not to lose faith, the Federal Reserve chairman offered a mostly bleak assessment of the difficulties ahead for the economy, and the administration’s latest effort to help the housing sector faced tough questioning in Congress. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/16/business/economy/16econ.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Oil: Ridiculous Story Lines(3): First we heard that ‘China is drilling off the coast of Cuba.’ A set of GOP’ers rattled off this talking point. Then, ‘Not a drop of oil was spilled from Katrina, so we can drill offshore without worry.’ Both are totally b.s. Add to that, “Drill Here. Drill Now. Pay Less”- a campaign organized by Newt Gingrich’s 527, “American Solutions.” A grand idea, one that would provide a smidgen of oil in 7-10 years.

As gas prices continue to increase, Congress continues to blame others while ignoring practical steps to stop the pain Americans are feeling at the pump. To lower gasoline prices and reduce our dependence on foreign oil, we need real solutions to our energy challenges.http://www.americansolutions.com/actioncenter/petitions/?Guid=54ec6e43-75a8-445b-aa7b-346a1e096

CAMPAIGN: Obama goes from NY Times op ed to a major address on Iraq, where he emphasizes “lost opportunities” by ignoring Afghanistan. Nothing new, but helpful to give him more stature, as someone versed in foreign policy.

The New Yorker: The article: Ryan Lizza’s article is unremarkable and basically says that Obama is a politician who has moved up faster than the typical politician. Revelatory!

Perhaps the greatest misconception about Barack Obama is that he is some sort of anti-establishment revolutionary. Rather, every stage of his political career has been marked by an eagerness to accommodate himself to existing institutions rather than tear them down or replace them. When he was a community organizer, he channeled his work through Chicago's churches, because they were the main bases of power on the South Side. He was an agnostic when he started, and the work led him to become a practicing Christian. At Harvard, he won the presidency of the Law Review by appealing to the conservatives on the selection panel. In Springfield, rather than challenge the Old Guard Democratic leaders, Obama built a mutually beneficial relationship with them. "You have the power to make a United States senator," he told Emil Jones in 2003. In his downtime, he played poker with lobbyists and Republican lawmakers. In Washington, he has been a cautious senator and, when he arrived, made a point of not defining himself as an opponent of the Iraq war. http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/07/21/080721fa_fact_lizza?printable=true

McCain’s- “…for all the irony-challenged literalists who were upset by the New Yorker’s Obama-as-a-Muslim magazine cover”: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/horsey/viewbydate.asp?ID=1792

Democratic Disunity: Theda Skocpol, academic / thinker / social policy guru:

Michael Kinsley has an incisive opinion piece at TIME/CNN called "Divided They Fall" -- and I urge everyone to read it. Kinsley points out that Republicans are setting aside their gripes about McCain and uniting to do battle, but progressives and Democrats are up to the same old internal sniping: single issue people bashing Obama for moving to the middle or voting a certain way on FISA, when his vote made no difference at all to the outcome; Clintonites using media sexism in the primary as an excuse to threaten to stay home or vote for McCain; fat cats who backed Clinton complaining to the New York Times, along with the blustering egotists like Carville; Jesse Jackson sniping about the common-sense notion that black people might have to be good parents as well as expect help from government.

This leaves one very sad. The social and redistributive stakes in this election are enormous. McCain can easily win if this summer is wasted, if Democrats do not unite and go on the offensive, if funders withold their efforts, if gripers undermine. But that seems to be what we are all doing.

I look back over an adult lifetime of this, of identity-oriented and single-issue groups undermining any chance for a convincing message relevant to all working middle class people. This lack of discipline and inability to sort out the fundamental from the partial is what has made it so hard for Democrats to win -- and has cost the country terribly in terms of the undermining of middle class wellbeing. Why are we doing it again? Why are we playing along with all the diversions and distractions the media wants to pursue, rather than speaking loudly with one voice for Obama and in drumbeat criticism of McCain? The summer weeks are precious, as we should have learned in 2004 -- mistakes now cannot be fixed later. At a moment when a core, long-term econmic advisor to McCain, Phil Gramm, has revealed the true heartlessness and stupidity behind conservative economic doctrines, we progressives are still talking about Jackson and FISA and Clinton's debts and overwrought claims of sexism. We are not hitting McCain/Gramm/Bush again and again in ways that would force some of the media, at least, to give the Gramm revelations -- they WERE revelations, not a "gaff" -- half the attention and staying power of the Wright ravings! http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/07/11/can_progressives_unite_or_will/

McCain: Obama Wants U.S. to Lose in Iraq; Meanwhile, he’s altered his Afghan policy to mirror Obama’s. He too now calls for pulling brigades out of Iraq and putting them in Afghanistan. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/15/AR2008071503018.html?hpid=topnews

The latest McCain strategy was unveiled on a conference call with reporters this morning, best summarized by McCain adviser Randy Scheunemann: "Sen. Obama seems to think losing a war will help him win an election

The McCain campaign, which has said it doesn't question Obama's patriotism, is now doing something awfully similar: Claiming that Barack Obama and the Democrats are dedicated to losing the war for their own political benefit.

The new accusation was unveiled on a McCain campaign conference call moments ago, with top McCain surrogates making this charge in tandem.

Sen. Lindsey Graham said that a "turning point" was when Harry Reid declared the war "lost" over a year ago, and brought up an old quote from Chuck Schumer predicting that discontent with the war would lead to further Democratic gains. "The Democratic Party built a political strategy around us losing the war in Iraq," Graham said.

McCain adviser Randy Scheunemann joined in: "Senator Obama seems to think losing a war will help him win an election." http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/07/mccain_campaign_obama_dems_wan.php

Humor: Jay Leno Chooses Bush Sr.

"Today, President Bush lifted the presidential ban on offshore drilling that was imposed by his father, the first President Bush, 18 years ago. But hey, remember Bush's dad also said invading Iraq would be a huge disaster, and cutting taxes would ruin the economy. So what the hell did he know?" http://www.usnews.com/usnews/politics/bulletin/bulletin_080715.htm#political_humor

-R

Iraq: Giving Up on a Long-term Agreement? Conflicting stories in the media, with the majority voicing that al-Maliki has blocked such and forced an interim agreement to be drafted, one that would confirm the presence of U.S. troops only through 2009.

U.S. and Iraqi negotiators have abandoned efforts to conclude a comprehensive agreement governing the long-term status of U.S troops in Iraq before the end of the Bush presidency, according to senior U.S. officials, effectively leaving talks over an extended U.S. military presence there to the next administration.

In place of the formal status-of-forces agreement negotiators had hoped to complete by July 31, the two governments are now working on a "bridge" document, more limited in both time and scope, that would allow basic U.S. military operations to continue beyond the expiration of a U.N. mandate at the end of the year.

The failure of months of negotiations over the more detailed accord -- blamed on both the Iraqi refusal to accept U.S. terms and the complexity of the task -- deals a blow to the Bush administration's plans to leave in place a formal military architecture in Iraq that could last for years.

Although President Bush has repeatedly rejected calls for a troop withdrawal timeline, "we are talking about dates," acknowledged one U.S. official close to the negotiations. Iraqi political leaders "are all telling us the same thing. They need something like this in there. . . . Iraqis want to know that foreign troops are not going to be here forever." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/12/AR2008071201915.html

Afghanistan: Significant U.S. casualties: Thus, not surprising that buzz is being generated about troops being re-deployed from Iraq to Afghanistan.

The Nato-led effort to subdue the Taliban suffered one of its heaviest blows since the 2001 invasion yesterday when nine US soldiers were killed and 15 other Nato troops injured in a day-long battle in a region close to the Pakistan border.

The US troops died as their base came under attack in Kunar province, eastern Afghanistan. The news puts further pressure on Pakistan, where coalition forces believe many Taliban militants are based. It was among the biggest losses for the coalition since the start of the war. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/14/usforeignpolicy.afghanistan

Advantage Taliban and Pakistan The U.S. is boxed in, militarily and politically. Syed Saleem Shahzad:

The resilient Taliban have proved unshakeable across Afghanistan over the past few months, making the chances of a coalition military victory against the popular tide of the insurgency in the majority Pashtun belt increasingly slim.

The alternative, though, of negotiating with radical Taliban leaders is not acceptable to the Western political leadership.

This stalemate suits Pakistan perfectly as it gives Islamabad the opportunity to once again step in to take a leading role in shaping the course of events in its neighboring country.

… Pakistan's planners now see their objective as isolating radicals within the Taliban and cultivating tribal, rustic, even simplistic, "Taliban boys" - just as they did in the mid-1990s in the leadup to the Taliban taking control of the country in 1996. It is envisaged that this new "acceptable" tribal-inspired Taliban leadership will displace Taliban and al-Qaeda radicalism.

This process has already begun in Pakistan's tribal areas. http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JG12Df01.html

Torture: Jane Mayer’s book sums up her previous work and more than confirms there’s been a well-established policy of torture. It notes that the Red Cross issued an explicit warning to the Bush-Cheney Administration that utilizing these techniques was a war crime which could result in criminal prosecution of U.S. leaders. The book provides case examples, tracks the development of the techniques and mentions an internal CIA investigation which had concluded that the program violated the Geneva Conventions and U.S. criminal law. Cheney intervened and the CIA report was blocked.

The book says Abu Zubaydah told the Red Cross that he had been waterboarded at least 10 times in a single week and as many as three times in a day.

The book also reports that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the chief planner of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, told the Red Cross that he had been kept naked for more than a month and claimed that he had been “kept alternately in suffocating heat and in a painfully cold room.”

The report says the prisoners considered the “most excruciating” of the methods being shackled to the ceiling and being forced to stand for as long as eight hours. Eleven of the 14 prisoners reported prolonged sleep deprivation, the book says, including “bright lights and eardrum-shattering sounds 24 hours a day.” http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/11/washington/11detain.html?_r=3&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Frank Rich summarizes:

We can no longer take cold comfort in the Watergate maxim that the cover-up was worse than the crime. This time the crime is worse than the cover-up, and the punishment could rain down on us all," - http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/13/opinion/13rich.html?hp

FISA Chris Hedges explains how his job will be made difficult, as it will be harder to evade surveillance and garner access:

This law will cripple the work of those of us who as reporters communicate regularly with people overseas, especially those in the Middle East. It will intimidate dissidents, human rights activists and courageous officials who seek to expose the lies of our government or governments allied with ours.

....The reach of such surveillance has already hampered my work. I was once told about a showdown between a U.S. warship and the Iranian navy that had the potential to escalate into a military conflict. I contacted someone who was on the ship at the time of the alleged incident and who reportedly had photos. His first question was whether my phone and e-mails were being monitored.

What could I say? How could I know? I offered to travel to see him but, frightened of retribution, he refused. I do not know if the man's story is true. I only know that the fear of surveillance made it impossible for me to determine its veracity. http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-hedges11-2008jul11,0,1553314.story

Iran: Attack or not to attack: Up to the Israelis? No, of course.

We’re left to read the ‘tea leaves.’ Adding all sources together, it seems less than a 50% possibility, even with an Obama win... as of now.

President George W Bush has told the Israeli government that he may be prepared to approve a future military strike on Iranian nuclear facilities if negotiations with Tehran break down, according to a senior Pentagon official.

Despite the opposition of his own generals and widespread scepticism that America is ready to risk the military, political and economic consequences of an airborne strike on Iran, the president has given an “amber light” to an Israeli plan to attack Iran’s main nuclear sites with long-range bombing sorties, the official told The Sunday Times.

“Amber means get on with your preparations, stand by for immediate attack and tell us when you’re ready,” the official said. But the Israelis have also been told that they can expect no help from American forces and will not be able to use US military bases in Iraq for logistical support.

Nor is it certain that Bush’s amber light would ever turn to green without irrefutable evidence of lethal Iranian hostility. Tehran’s test launches of medium-range ballistic missiles last week were seen in Washington as provocative and poorly judged, but both the Pentagon and the CIA concluded that they did not represent an immediate threat of attack against Israeli or US targets. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article4322508.ece

Economy: We hope for a soft landing. The multiple warning signs leave most economists unable to predict how long and deep this “downturn” will be, whether it will involve hyperinflation or deflation, whether it has one more year or much more. Friday’s developments- the huge stock drop of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae shook many. The media, including Sunday’s business sections, generally sought to reassure, though some cautioned to secure your bank funds in view of the Indy bank failing late last week.

Freddie and Fannie triggered unusually aggressive federal action:

Alarmed by the sharply eroding confidence in the nation’s two largest mortgage finance companies, the Bush administration on Sunday asked Congress to approve a sweeping rescue package that would give officials the power to inject billions of federal dollars into the beleaguered companies through investments and loans.

In a separate announcement, the Federal Reserve said that it would make one of its short-term lending programs available to the two companies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The Fed said that it had made its decision “to promote the availability of home mortgage credit during a period of stress in financial markets.”

An official said the Fed’s lending program was approved at the request of the Treasury, but that it was temporary and would probably end once Congress approved Treasury’s plan. Some officials briefed on the plan said Congress could be asked to extend the total line of credit to the institutions to $300 billion. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/washington/14fannie.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

Middle East: Optimism Reigns Multiple sources reflect the growing possibility of an accord

Israel will free Palestinian prisoners as a gesture to the Palestinian Authority unrelated to the prisoner exchange deals it is conducting with Hezbollah and Hamas, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert promised Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday.

Olmert and Abbas on Sunday met for trilateral talks with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, on the sidelines of the first summit of the Union for the Mediterranean.

Israel and the Palestinians have never been as close to peace as they are now, Olmert said at a press conference during the French-initiated regional conference.

"It seems to me that we have never been as close to the possibility of reaching an accord as we are today," Olmert told reporters standing alongside Abbas and Sarkozy.

Leaders of 43 countries from the European Union and the Mediterranean region met in Paris on Sunday for the summit, a Sarkozy-led initiative. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1001563.html

CAMPAIGN:

(1) Barack Obama is overwhelmingly Britain's choice to be the next US president, five times more popular than his Republican rival, John McCain, a Guardian/ICM poll shows today. Carried out ahead of the Democratic candidate's visit to Britain next week, the poll reveals that 53% feel certain he would make the best president, with only 11% favouring McCain; 36% declined to express an opinion.

Obama will soon set off on a marathon trip that will take in Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel, Jordan, Germany, France and, lastly, Britain. The exact timing of the visit to Iraq and Afghanistan is being kept under wraps for security reasons, but he is expected in Britain on July 25 or 26. His campaign team and the British government had originally discussed making the UK his first stop but, citing diary clashes, rescheduled it as the last. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/14/barackobama.johnmccain

(2) Are there differences between Obama and McCain? Well, of course, but a theme of the past 2 weeks in the media is to find voices who will say that there isn’t. Without revisiting 2000, Iraq / the economy / privacy / appointments to the Supreme Court, etc. make for a vivid contrast.

Yet, some look to downplay the differences and play up the areas of agreement. This from the front page of the LA Times:

For Amy Rick, the 2008 presidential election is a win-win situation. Both Barack Obama and John McCain support an expansion of stem-cell research that she has battled for in vain under President Bush.

“Both are very solid,” said Rick, president of the Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research. “We are definitely looking forward with optimism to a change in policy in 2009.”

John Isaacs, an arms control advocate, feels the same way, because both candidates have made nuclear nonproliferation a priority. “We’ll have major progress on nuclear issues no matter who is elected,” said Isaacs, executive director of the Council for a Livable World.

Stem-cell research and nuclear weapons are just two examples of a surprising but little-noticed aspect of the 2008 campaign: Democrat Obama and Republican McCain agree on a range of issues that have divided the parties under Bush. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-centrists13-2008jul13,0,4649817.story

Who is Obama?

NEWSWEEK’s Poll:

Twelve percent of voters surveyed said that Obama was sworn in as a United States senator on a Qur'an, while 26 percent believe the Democratic candidate was raised as a Muslim and 39 percent believe he attended a Muslim school as a child growing up in Indonesia. None of these things is true.

…while…

The Pew Poll found that 1% of Americans think Obama is Jewish. http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_plank/archive/2008/07/10/barack-obama-secret-jew.aspx

-R