Reporting from CSIS Listen/watch taped event –updated– 5:40:58 PM: Bob Schieffer, moderator; Edward Luce, Nancy Youssef, Rajiv Chandrasekaran, David Sanger. 5:45:00 PM: Schiefer: Bush saw it as 2 policies; Obama sees it as one. 5:47:40 PM: Sanger: Obama policy says nothing about “democratization,” it’s about getting al Qaeda, which is in Pak. 5:49:42 PM: Chandra.: [...]
Tag Archives | Afghanistan
North Korea’s Nukes
North Korea threatened a military response to South Korean participation in a U.S.-led program to seize weapons of mass destruction, and said it will no longer abide by the 1953 armistice that ended the Korean War. – Bloomberg Secretary Clinton weighed in this past hour: “North Korea has made a choice. It has chosen to [...]
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Around the World
–updated– Starting at home, with one lone Republican thinking casting Speaker Pelosi as “Pussy Galore” is “reprehensible, irresponsible and unpersuasive.” Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) told Politico Saturday: “I thought it was reprehensible, irresponsible and unpersuasive. If we’re going to regain the credibility of the American people, we’re going to have to stop with silly antics [...]
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Let the Fearmongering Continue
–updated– It’s the how low can you go? game, with Michael Steele and the Republicans. Desperation time and it’s not even an election season. The web ad is a take off on the famous “Daisy” ad taken to new lows. This time it’s not nuclear war to fear, but the closure of Guantanamo. Nuclear war [...]
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Gates Fires Gen. McKiernan
Gates asked for Gen. McKiernan’s resignation after talking with Petraeus, getting Pres. Obama’s okay. Ouch. And that’s the door that just hit you, sir. Abu Muqawama, who served with McChrystal: I do know that many policy-makers and journalists think that McChrystal’s work as the head of the super-secret Joint Special Operations Command was the untold [...]
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Survivor Times
via Huffington Post What do Pres. Karzai of Afghanistan and the current crop of Republicans have in common? George W. Bush was their patron, but isn’t anymore, so they’re finding themselves in dire straights in Obama’s time. There’s a lengthy article in the Washington Post that lays it all out, but this gives you a [...]
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Round the World, and a Saudi Demand
Nobody really pays enough attention to our relationships with the Saudis. But if we want anything done in the Middle East, especially since Egypt and Hamas don’t exactly play well together, according to all the experts I’ve been listening to recently, the Saudis will have to play, perhaps, the major role, beyond the U.S. It’s [...]
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The Obligatory First 100 Days Review
This day is going to be interminably long. It’s going to be redundant on so many levels. It’s also going to be gratifying for Democrats, while only adding to Republican depression. The one real issue in question being Obama’s resolve and his willingness to confront. One review says the window is the auto crisis. I [...]
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As Goes Punjab, So Goes Pakistan
Another drone attack in Pakistan. A suicide bomber kills at least 20 security forces personnel and policemen in Islamabad. Meanwhile, leading Red Mosque Islamic cleric Aziz, fresh from a two-year house arrest, calls for sharia law in Pakistan. While the world joins in at a donor’s conference, pledging $5 billion to keep Pakistan from falling [...]
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Afghan Women Confront Top Shiite Cleric
–updated– This is as in your face as you can get in Afghanistan. Sometimes pictures say it all. Ayatollah Asif Mohsini didn’t know what him, because it’s never happened before. Responding to the outcry, Mr. Karzai has begun looking for a way to remove the most controversial parts of the law. In an interview on [...]
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Obama’s Nixon to China Moment on Iran
Once again Richard Cohen provides foundational reality: I think it’s almost certainly too late to stop Iran achieving virtual nuclear power status — something like Brazil’s or Japan’s mastery of the know-how without a weapon. Iran’s advances of the past eight years cannot be undone. What can be transformed is the context Iran operates in; [...]
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AFGHANISTAN: Conyers Calls Obama ‘Embarrassingly Naive’
This may turn out to be a tale of “bipartisanship and the Blue Dogs,” neither of which excites me. But when it comes to Afghanistan, well, get it done ugly if you have to, but get it done. Via WSJ: Mr. Obama is expected to seek congressional approval of $75.5 billion for the wars, perhaps [...]
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‘Peace Deal’ in Swat Region Called Off
First I’d have to ask if you can call anything a “peace deal” if it sacrifices women on its altar. You know my answer to that one. Secondly, if you break your promises of “peace” through kidnappings, police murders and general civic mayhem, why should anyone care if you call of the “peace deal”? Then [...]
Jackasses, and Fleeing Rats
From Norm Coleman’s sinking ship. Tuesday, April 07, 2009 Norm Coleman [Ramesh Ponnuru] I think it’s time for him to give up this fight. 04/07 03:05 PMShare The jackass is obvious. He’s the guy in the video who flew to Afghanistan so he could attack Robert Gates and by extension President Obama, using his “support [...]
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Global Outrage Over Karzai Rape Law Brings Change
President Karzai underestimated the global attention that legalizing rape in Afghanistan would cause. Karzai’s rape law has now been put on hold. Being a signatore of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights means something. Especially when you have the American President calling you out openly, as Barack Obama did by calling Karzai’s rape law “abhorrent.” [...]
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