158 Democrats Vote Against the Minimum Wage

And against a reduction in the death tax, but it's the minimum wage part that hurts. If you haven't turned on a TV in the last 18 hours, the Republicans pulled a brilliant bait and switch - they agreed to let the minimum wage come up for a vote, in a package that would also exempt the first $5 million of an individual's estate or $10 million of a couple's estate from the death tax. Democrats have understandably been screaming bloody murder, but I'm not all that sure if they're angrier about the "principle" of the bill (which hopefully is at worst a wash for small business) than about the fact they got cornered by Rove & Co...brilliantly. This minimum wage hike affect a miniscule number of families, and a large number of suburban teenagers flipping burgers at the Golden Arches (and after reading Fast Food Nation I find myself with a shortage of charity towards McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, etc.); the estate tax reduction (and can we be honest and admit that claiming this minor adjustment affects the "super-rich" is pathetic? The super-rich measure their wealth not in millions but in billions) benefits small businesses and working farms who are asset rich and cash poor and to whom the estate tax truly is a death tax. Taking a stand on the minimum wage is merely symbolic, but working to alleviate the threat of lost livelihoods for future generations.
Decent coverage from the AP here.
The full roll-call (#425) here.

Pot Calling the Kettle Black?

Kos has polling data showing Cynthia "I Beat Cops and Get Away With It" McKinney losing to a primary challenger in the upcoming runoff (damn fool couldn't top 50% and avoid said runoff). That's a sad day for Republicans - she's the sort of Democrat we all love. But what's really funny is the Kossacks calling her an embarassment to their party...excuse me? She is, but all you moonbats most certainly are too. Y'all are in the same boat. Indeed, I don't think the Democratic Party has had someone to be truly proud of since they lost Scoop Jackson and more recently, Moynihan.

NOTE: One of my readers (and I have my suspicions as to who) playfully asked if by Scoop Jackson I meant the basketball pundit. Hardly. I meant Henry "Scoop" Jackson the senator from Washington for thirty years and a two-time Democratic presidential candidate.

Can't Believe I've Been Silent for So Long!

Okay so honestly, I've been quiet and quit blogging regularly going on two weeks now. But there's something addictive about all of this, especially since it lets me vent the frustration that comes with my daily news fix...

I suppose I could start talking about Israel and keep talking about it all day, but what's most worth noting for the time being is that Hizbullah rockets have hit deeper into Israel than they had previously, some thirty miles south of the Israeli-Lebanon border. These are apparently a new type, but whether or not they have the capability to hit Tel Aviv is at present unclear. AP's got it here; I'll get commentary from other blogs soon.

Two news stories that have been underreported but deserve to be highlighted from Latin America. First of all, in Nicaragua, former Sandinista cauldillo Daniel Ortega looks poised to win his country's upcoming presidential election. Needless to say, he's close amigos with everyone's favor dictator Hugo Chavez. This is also part of a larger trend of political amnesia that's sweeping Latin America (see Garcia's reelection about two months ago, after he already ruined the Peruvian economy in the 80s). What I'm unsure of is whether this is part and parcel of the short-sighted renunciation of neo-liberal economics or something marginally different.

The second and equally disturbing story is that Russia and Venezuela have inked a series of arms deals for military helicopters and and aircraft. Although details, such as models, are hard to come by, the package was apparently valued at more than $3 billion and included 24 planes and 53 helicopters. While Chavez is mum on their purpose, I have a guess: regional intimidation. Reports claim he's been in league with FARC in Colombia, no doubt an attempt to destabilize our strongest ally in the region, and though an all-out war is rather unlikely, such arms deals (which Chavez can clearly afford with oil at its current price) may be a sort of warning shot across the bow of the Colombian ship of state.

Morning News Roundup July 20th

Bush is live at the NAACP convention right now, discussing education...needless to say the crowd's not all that enthusiastic, but there is some applause. He's doing okay, but I think it's telling that the loudest applause he's gotten so far was when he asked if anyone from Texas was in the audience. Besides education he's harping on the inequality of opportunity in this nation and the importance of home and business ownership as well as what his administration's done to further those goals. Now...death tax. Guessing this one will go over like a lead balloon. Talking Condi up...talking about the Voting Rights Act as well, to thunderous applause.

Israel dropped twenty-three tons of high explosive on the suspected refuge of Hizbullah high command; as far as I can tell, the Israelis didn't get any of their targets. Israel's also talking about a full-scale invasion, an option that isn't out of the question considering their goal of at least driving Hizbullah out of rocket range from northern Israel. The New York Times cites some military analysts who note that this operation might not be succesful without boots on the ground - and I suspect they may be right in that. But whereas I suspect the NYT is trying to suggest that Israel cannot succeed, I disagree - they have the chutzpah to do what's nececssary to secure their northern border.

The collateral damage toll continues to rise, with some estimates claiming 300 Lebanese civilians dead (and half a million in flight), and about a tenth of that dead in Israel (can't find Palestinian death tolls). As tragic as all of this is, I'll reiterate what I've said before: the blood is on the hands of the terrorists who take refuge among civilian populations and deliberately target civilians leaving the Israelis no option but to respond.

Marines are aiding in the evacuation of US civilians from the region. I think it's pretty clear that the greater the efforts to get our people out of there, the greater the level of concern at State and elsewhere about the potential for this to get worse before it gets better.

After Bush's first veto on that stem cell bill (HR 810?), the House failed to override by about 50 votes. A lot of critics are claiming this was little more than a ploy for socially moderate Republicans to distance themselves from the President, but regardless, the President's veto was a bad move.

The Kossacks are jubilantly citing a new Quinnipiac poll showing Lamont narrowly beating Lieberman in the Connecticut Democratic primary. But it's really just a moot point when the poll shows Lieberman romping to victory as an independent. Though he'll never caucus with the Republicans, it'll be interesting to see Lieberman's greeting when he returns to the Senate as an independent...

Back After the Break

So now that my six week stint of sitting in a cubicle for 45 hours a week is over, I'm finding it slightly more difficult to sit down and blog. But I promise I'll try to do so, just because I know I have a small cadre of devoted readers out there. Anyways...

The Middle East continues to blow up, if you weren't aware, I think you're beyond any help. Anyways, Bush was caught on open mike today using less than diplomatic four-letter words while expressing a correct and crucial sentiment. The setting's even better:

"'See the irony is that what they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this s--- and it's over," Bush told Blair as he chewed on a buttered roll."

A caller on Cavuto today complained about his manners - I think Bush's disapproval just shot up among the Newport and Martha's Vineyard demographics...

Israel also launched a brief incursion into southern Lebanon this morning, but pulled back after a brief stay. They were clearly trying to drive off or destroy rocket launchers and crews; whether or not they were succesful is debatable at present. Obviously, early suspicions that this might be the recreation of a buffer zone such as the one that existed previously in southern Lebanon were unfounded. However it is noteworthy that the most recent rocket barrages have not been the regular Katyushas, but rather more sophisticated missiles designed by Iran and built by Syria, intended to do maximum damage to people by spraying a concentrated blast of ball-bearings (think a rocket shotgun). Bastards.

A Note on Polling

I'd never paid much attention to all of the various firms out there until I got into campaigning last summer; when you're alert, you notice that some are better than others, and more accurately predict elections. A regular reader over at The Fix posted a statistical breakdown of the various big firms' successes in 2004, and I thought it worth posting here, just to give you all an idea of how credible all of these numbers are:

In reviewing state by state polling by various firms in the 2004 Presidential race, I set up a quick scoring system to judge accuracy.

Taking the final poll done by each firm in a state and matching with actual results, I scored 1 pt for each correct call of the state, 3 pts for the exact margin of victory/1 pt if within margin of error (3%) and 3 pts for calling the candidate vote total by exacft percentage / 1 pt. within MoE.

I also tracked misses (states called incorrectly) and quality picks (where the state was called and the margin and candidate percentages were all within the MoE). No points were awarded for misses:

Results:

ARG (American Research Group)
44 states polled
131 pts. (avg. 2.997)
5 misses (11.36%)
10 quality picks (22.73%)

Gallup
10 states
19 pts. (avg. 1.9)
4 misses (40%)
2 quality picks (20%)

Mason Dixon
21 states
92 pts. (avg. 4.381)
1 miss (4.76%)
7 quality picks (33.33%)

Quinnipiac
5 states
11 pts. (avg. 2.2)
1 miss (20%)
0 quality picks (0%)

Rasmussen
30 states
101 pts. (avg. 3.367)
1 miss (3.33%)
13 quality picks (43.33%)

Research 2000
11 states
39 pts. (avg. 3.545)
0 misses (0.0%)
6 quality picks (54.55%)

Strategic Vision
11 states
24 pts. (avg. 2.182)
4 misses (36.36%)
3 quality picks (27.27%)

Survey USA
30 states
116 pts. (avg. 3.867)
1 miss (3.33%)
16 quality picks (53.33%)

Zogby
20 states
55 pts. (avg. 2.75)
3 misses (15%)
6 quality picks (30%)
1 perfect call- Missouri

The state by state polling data was compiled at: www.tripias.com/state/

The point system may be worthless as I just concocted it myself but it allows a comparison since all firms did not poll in all states.

As far as accuracy, Mason Dixon, Rasmussen and Survey USA came away with only 1 miss and had the most net quality picks minus misses

Thanks RMill - awesome as always.

New Numbers in Rhode Island

And they aren't all that hot. Rasmussen (which a friend of mine described as "in the same septic tankas Lake [Tester's polling firm] - only floating a little higher") released them to members only today but someone released them at the Providence Journal. They show Republican incumbent Lincoln Chafee losing to Democratic nominee Sheldon Whitehouse 41%-46%, and Republican insurgent Steve Laffey getting destroyed by Whitehouse 29%-57%. In June, the Chafee-Whitehouse numbers were 42%-44%; a month before, Chafee was up by 3%. All this time, Laffey has been unequivocally being swept aside by Whitehouse. Rasmussen here. The July poll questioned 500 likely voters, margin of error +/-4.5%.

Assuming Chafee pulls past Laffey in the primary, he'll receive a small bounce - but with only 5% separating the two candidates, every little bit helps. I don't think debates will be to Chafee's benefit, but then again I'm not sure they'll help Whitehouse either (for that matter I don't think I've heard either campaign even mention the idea).

Oil Update

With afternoon trading continuing, and the prospect of prices rising even higher in after-hours trading as they did yesterday, prices on futures of both Brent and light sweet crude are up, passing $78/barrel. Analysts are predicting prices to rise further, breaking $80/barrel under the combined pressure of events in the Middle East and Africa; another hurricane in the producing regions of the Gulf of Mexico could also cause a further spike in oil prices. Gas prices presently average $2.96 but are expected to rise.

Heh

After what was a relatively close special election in the CA50 (and an expensive special for the GOP!), Republican victor Brian Bilbray is seeing some sort of incumbent bump. New numbers from SurveyUSA show him beating Democratic nominee/special election nominee Francine Busby 51%-40% (566 LV, +/- 4.2%)

Middle East Muddle

Breaking: Multiple sources are saying that the Israeli air force has struck at a Beirut building suspected to be housing a high-ranking member of the Hizbullah terrorist organization.

Israel seems to be isolating Beirut, blockading the city, shutting down the airports, and taking out bridges on the highway to Syria, according to AP. What this seems to indicate to me is a serious willingness to take care of the Hizbullah leadership, finishing what should have been done long ago. Israel, meantime, claims its goal is a more difficult disarmament; considering that on a per capita basis your average unstable Middle Eastern nation has more guns than an Idaho militia, I think a more focused goal might be desirable.

If indeed Syria and/or Iran are behind the kidnappings and the escalation, then it appears they've miscalculated - and they've blinked. JPost reports that both Syria and Saudi Arabia criticized Hizbullah's attacks, Syria calling for them to stop their missile attacks in northern Israel. Syria's reaction, I think, is informed by a fear of Israel turning its focus to Damascus. However, I don't think Syria's attempts to separate themselves from Hizbullah's attacks will work if Israel feels that sufficient pressure on Damascus might resolve the crisis to their liking.

One telling report from JPost serves to strengthen the case for implicating Iran in all of this: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has promised to repair the damages to Lebanese infrastructure caused by Israeli airstrikes. The man clearly doesn't want to directly involve his own forces (though Iran has apparently used Revolutionary Guards units in Lebanon before), but sees his Hizbullah proxies seriously shaken by the Israeli counteroffensive. Thus an obvious solution is to indirectly support them through infrastructure repair, allowing Iran to continue to arm the terrorist group.

Another clue to Israel's role will come next week in the wake of the G8 conference. Concerns about Israeli reactions to terrorist aggression have supplanted any substantive discussion of Iran's attempts to secure nuclear weapons. If this was, as I suspect, one of Tehran's goals in unleashing Hizbullah and Hamas, we should see a significant reduction in missile attacks and overall aggression, perhaps even the surrender of the captured soldiers, next week.

Apparently conservative fears about Syria and Iran being the puppeteers in this fracas are catching on as Chirac said essentially the same thing yesterday. Chirac also joined the growing chorus of world opinion that called Israel's reactions to the kidnappings disproportionate, a typical response to most Israeli actions. Of course in typical European hypocrisy, UN humanitarian official Jan Egeland said "You are supposed to do something to the armed group. You are not supposed to hurt the children of people who have nothing to do with this." While Egeland was talking about Israeli targeted airstrikes with civilian collateral damage, the sentiment is far more apropos to the missile barrages launched by Hizbullah without pretense of a military target.

It's becoming clear that, despite Lebanese pleas and public pressure, President Bush will make no effort to force a cease-fire upon Israel. Although there are justifiable concerns about Lebanon's fledgling democracy being weakened by the continued conflict, I certainly think this is a classic example of "whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Even the democratic, nominally pro-Western Lebanese government of the present post-Syria era has resisted disarming Hizbullah as such an action could potentially reignited civil war such as the one that tore the country apart in the 1980s. If the government will not undertake to disarm the terrorists, then perhaps the Israelis can do it for them. There are of course weaknesses in this plan, such as turning more Lebanese against the Israelis, but in the long run an essential ingredient for Middle Eastern peace is a stable Lebanon free of terrorist parasites like Hizbullah.

Also from JPost: Mahmoud Abbas has apparently threatened to resign, dismantle the Palestinian Authority, and withdraw from the Palestinian Territories during a call with Condoleeza Rice, claiming he no longer has any authority and that Israel is destroying his infrastructure. There is a sort of historical precedent for such actions, as the PLO under Arafat spent several years in exile in Tunis during the early to mid 1980s, having fled an Israeli invasion of Lebanon and displacing them from their old haunts in Beirut.

An interesting op-ed by the editor of the Lebanese Daily Star. Although I don't agree with all of his points, it's worth reading; I'll try and deconstruct it fully later.

In examining the roots of this contest, Charles Kruathamer cuts to the heart of the matter and places the blame where it belongs: with terrorist organizations seeking an end to what they see as an illegal, racist, Zionist state. Two quotes will suffice; I'd suggest reading the whole thing:

The fighting is about "the core 1948 issues, rather than the secondary ones from 1967."

In 1967 Israel acquired the "occupied territories." In 1948 Israel acquired life. The fighting raging now in 2006 -- between Israel and the "genocidal Islamism" (to quote the writer Yossi Klein Halevi) of Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran behind them -- is about whether that life should and will continue to exist.

Also, and more succintly: "The issue is, and has always been, Israel's existence. That is what is at stake." That's all for now folks.

Morning News Roundup

I'll stay away from the Middle East for the time being, and devote a lot of space to that region in a little while.

• It's Bastille Day in France - happy independence, Frogfriends. As I noted last night, foreign relations sanity may slowly be returning to that part of the world. (I'll try and find a link to that journal for any Francophone readers I may have.)
• A new AP-Ipsos poll claims that "America wants Democrats in power" - and I'd love nothing more than to be beaten with a stick. Right. You really want Democrats in power? Anyways, that laugh aside, the poll finds the President's approval holding steady at 36% among 1,000 adults. Among 789 registered voters, Democrats are favored on the generic congressional ballot 51%-40%, with 81% of "liberals," 56% of "moderates", and 24% of "conservatives" (all self-identified) saying they'll vote for the Democrat in their district. Among leaners, Democrats also have an edge 51%-41%. While none of this is good news, it's not surprising news considering the traditional "six-year itch" as well as public unease over gas prices, immigration, and the war. Should Congress succeed in passing an enforcement-first immigration bill between now and the elections, I suspect we'll see the number of conservatives voting left decline. The other two factors, gas prices and the war, should they be get better in the eyes of the public, I supect we'll see more moderates switch back towards the GOP. I had a pollster tell me that the generic ballot was going Democrat, but in the districts people are still happy with their Congressman. Should that trend continue, I think the GOP holds the House and probably the Senate.
• In what the GOP hopes is an "open mouth, insert foot" moment for the Left, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, under the aegis of Chicago Congressman Rahm Emmanuel, has released an ad depicting Tom DeLay as a criminal and trying to use images of flag-draped coffins for political benefit. The Tribune goes hard after Emmanuel too, noting his frequent use of the war and the sacrifice of our soldiers for political benefit. The add can be found on the DCCC's website.
• Victor Davis Hanson, a favorite columnist of mine, has a great one today. It's basic premise is that Bush needs to man up and tell the American people (and the world, I think), that "since Sept. 11, 2001, it has had to choose between options that are bad or far worse." This is the kind of argument that needs to be made, that we're not in some socially just utopian ideal but rather in a war and locked in combat with a nihilistic amoral enemy so there are no good choices, just bad and worse. To quote him at length,

  Ultimately, the Bush administration needs to do a better job of presenting this current war in a far larger context. Jihadists of the Arab world for decades have been at war not with George W. Bush alone, but with modernity itself. The radical Middle East street may be fascinated by the Internet, satellite TV, automated teller machines and cell phones--but not by the foreign anathema of democracies, religious tolerance, free markets and gender equality that ultimately account for such goodies.
  
  So there are many fronts in our struggle against Islamic terrorists from the 7th Century. The American people must be reminded of our challenges constantly in lieu of platitudes about the inevitable triumph of freedom and democracy. In short, our government should provide much more explanation of this complex war and far fewer simple declarations about it.

I think that's it for right now, I'll definietly post more as the day goes on.

Worth Noting:

From the June 19th issue of the Weekly Standard: France has a neocon movement, embodied by the "Cercle de l'Oratoire", a

group of dissenters from the weird ideology now dominant among a French elite that hates America more than it hates Islamofascism.

Their circle has grown considerably since its inception after 9/11, and many are "classical" neocons, that is to say former leftists; neoconservatives are, as Irving Kristol quipped, "liberals mugged by reality." Now their writings and thoughts have found a new form in Le Meilleur des mondes, a journal of neoconservative French thought. Years ago, I perused "The Neoconservative Reader" (or I think that was the title); included were essays by leading European neocons, but I don't remember any Frenchmen included there. I guess that's changed, indeed I think a form of international sanity is slowly dawning in Europe as they begin to fully comprehend the threat posed by Iran and North Korea.

Good News from Montana

Reported in Hotline On Call:
Lake Research, 6/20-6/26, 1200 likely voters, +/- 2.8%
Conrad Burns (R): 43%
Jon Tester (D): 42%


Burns Fav/Unfav: 46%/50%
Tester: 48%/18%

Although I like these numbers (statistical dead heat is better than the Rasmusen numbers here), several avenues of criticism are immediately apparent, first and foremost the 6-day span over which the poll was conducted. Burns' fav/unfav could also be better, but they look worse than they really are compared to Tester's, which are probably skewed by his relatively low profile. Also, Burns has a very significant fundraising advantage ($2.7 million COH to less than $200k COH) which might make a difference in the long run. Eat that Kos and your people-power.

UPDATE
I looked at the Rasmussen numbers and since I tend to trust them more, I'm in a little bit of a funk about this. Tried to post a graph of the numbers, but it didn't work. Suffice to say from a pre-primary starting point with Burns up 3 47%-44%, he's lost 4% while Tester's gained 6% so as to be up 50%-43% in the latest Rasmussen numbers. Doesn't mean I won't tout the Lake Research numbers though...

Oil Update

In after-hours trading, light sweet crude for August delivery hit $76.70. Yes you read that right. So long as the oil market is plagued with uncertainty about the Middle East, especially Iran and Israel, and continued unrest in Nigeria where oil facilities today exploded in what some are alleging is sabotage. Such production shocks are of course only exacerbated by growing market demand in India and China and a stagnating supply; no fields on the scale of Saudi or the Permian Basin have been discovered in decades. I'll try to do a longer piece on oil and how we might decrease the price this weekend, assuming things in Gaza/Israel/Lebanon/(Syria)/(Iran) settle down a bit.

Supplemental Maps

Left: locations of Hizbullah missile strikes. Below: general map of Israel; Safed, where the civilian was killed, is roughly east of Nahariyya.

Thanks to the CIA and Counterterrorism Blog for these!

Israel Update

Continued updates (more than I can do) from Pajamas Media here. I'll excerpt this stuff as I have the opportunity to do so. I'll also try and hunt down more "on the ground" blogs so we can get a sense of how the locals on all sides perceive this conflict developing.

Things are continuing to get tenser, the most striking provocation to date being Hizbullah launching rockets at the Israeli port of Haifa, 18 miles inside Israeli territory. Hizbullah surprisingly denies the attack while the Israelis report no casualites (thankfully). Unfortunately what we've seen here is a cycle of action and reaction - Israeli invasion provoked by Hizbullah kidnappings first, now on a more dangerous level, strikes on the Beirut airport greeted by rockets over Haifa. According to JPost, one civilian died in the rocket barrage on Safed, near Haifa.

Israeli ambassador to the US is also quoted by the BBC as saying

international community should make it clear to Iran and Syria - who both have links with Hezbollah - that they were "playing with fire".

Whether or not the international community, especially the UN, can be persuaded to do just that, and get past blaming Israel for the violence, remains to be seen. It seems that Egypt may be getting the message, blaming primarily Syria - but here again I suspect that Syria is merely doing Tehran's bidding. Also worth noting here - that NYC tunnel plot exposed last week had a Lebanese connection; in light of recent developments that seems even more ominous.

AP reports that Israel is warning Lebanese civilians to stay clear of Hizbullah-infested neighborhoods in Beirut, while simultaneously announcing that "nothing is safe" - no target is off limits. No doubt the precursor to the sort of targeted killings we've witnessed against the Hamas leadership lately. Also, the latest barrage of Hizbullah missiles appears to be a more advanced type?

From the Counterterrorism Blog, a profile of Hizbullah military chief Imad Mugniyah suspected to be behind the kidnappings, as well as the '83 Beirut bombings, the '96 Khobar Towers attack, and a string of anti-Israeli strikes around the world. Clearly this guy's a bad character; hopefully the Israelis can put an end to his rampage in the near future.

In reports I haven't seen confirmed, an Israeli extremist group calling itself the “Gilad Shalhevet Brigades” claims it has kidnapped two Palestinians from the Jerusalem area to use as bartering chips for the return of the kidnapped Israeli soldiers. In a show of sanity, Israeli police say they are investigating the claims rather than letting the only rational side in this conflict be hijacked by extremists.

The US also scuttled a UN resolution that would have called for what sounds like a unilateral cessation of military action by Israel...such unilateral pullback is clearly unacceptable and would only serve to embolden Hamas and Hizbullah.

Shaken by all of this, oil closed at nearly $77 a barrel, with the DOW down 168.

Israel Update

From the Jerusalem Post: Israeli inteligence suspects that Hizbullah is is trying to move its kindapped Israeli soldiers to Iran. Maybe that's why the Israelis have been disabling transportation infrastructure? Of course the wto aren't entirely lost if they get to Iran, but things get a lot more difficult...another Entebbe perhaps?

News from the Rest of the World

• Journal has it (no link because they're overprotective of their content) that the Senate's reached a compromise on offshore drilling and will actually pass it. Thank god.
• The Gang of 14 is supposedly meeting today to preemptively discuss William Haynes' 4th Circuit nomination. In a year when we've got much bigger issues to debate than judicial nominations, and getting caught up in a partisan pissing contest to satisfy the bases of each party, I applaud these 14.
• Unsurprisingly, the Democrats are pushing again to get a vote on the minimum wage before the August recess. This is, in essence, a feel-good issue as the number of people working full-time minimum wage jobs to support themselves or their families is minute but those employing minimum wage owners are often small businesses for whom a minimum wage hike could be a trip into the red. Admittedly, there are also plenty of minimum wage earners who are at McDonalds and elsewhere where a wage hike wouldn't be the end of the world, but it would pass higher on costs onto consumers. Sometimes I wonder if Democrats ever took an economics class in school, or at least one where the textbook wasn't Das Kapital.
• Bush is off to Europe for the G-8 Summit, a summit no doubt consumed by international issues throughout Southwest Asia.
• Some predictions have the economy slowing down in the near future due to rising energy costs and higher interest rates (I'll try and get a link soon, real work calls).
  

Must Read (repeatedly)

This is a Lebanese blogger in Beirut, linked from Sandmonkey - he's updating constantly, and will continue to do so until he loses power or internet. Just read it, I can't find a better perspective yet.

I have to say it's fascinating to see blog coverage from throughout the Middle East getting all of these different perspectives on events.

Morning News Roundup (Largely Middle East)

Starting with the Middle East

• Over night (by our standards), the Israeli Air Force struck at Beirut's main airport, effectively shutting down the place with attacks on all three runways. In retaliation, Hizballah forces have struck at towns, and an Arab village as well (poor blokes), in Northern Israeli. The strikes were missile launches conducted across the border; Hizballah had threatened to shell Haifa if Lebanon was hit and though that has not yet come to pass, I think these attacks were a substitute. Apparently no one was killed, but one civilian is in critical condition.
  
• Also from CNN, Israeli forces have struck at a military airfield in the Bekaa valley as well as instituted a naval blockade. All of this is clearly designed, as the IDF indicates, to "block the transfer of terrorists and weaponry;" strikes on nominally civilian targets such as the Beirut airport also indicate that Olmert's government is linking the Lebanese government with Hizballah, meaning that this isn't a war on Hizballah the terrorist organization but rather on the Lebanese state in an attempt to rid it of its parasitic terrorists.
• On the other front, an Israeli airstrike that killed nine civilians (and thus was widely condemned) seems to have also at least partially accomplished its goal: one Hamas military leader is reportedly paralyzed and apparently others were killed in the same strike. The onus for the civilian deaths is not on Israel for dropping the bomb, but on the Hamas leadership for secreting themselves among civilians without regard for those lives, typically callous and cowardly behavior on the part of terrorists.
• With all of their usual balance, the New York Times headline their coverage of all of this "Once Again, Gazans are Displaced by Israeli Occupiers." Why do I ever expect any better?
• Two interesting comments on a more strategic level are worth noting. First off, the Captain wonders "Is Lebanon the Right Target?" He's on to something, considering it's still Damascus directing Hizballah, and through them the Lebanese government, and thus Israel might benefit from pressuring Syria more than its current offensive. But having said that, I feel that Israel must first take care of the short-term immediate threat, namely Hizballah forces built up on the Israel-Lebanese border, before turning the pressure onto Syria. Also, attacks on Syria would provoke even more crisis and potentially a wider war. But reports of Israeli mobilization and reserves being called up indicates that such action may not be far away.
• Second, and more ominously, it's becoming the view of the conservative blogosphere (myself included) that what we now have on our hands is a proxy war against Iran, cover for them as they desperately try and obtain nuclear weapons. They tried stalling but it looked like we might get enough courage up to actually threaten sanctions, so they've launched other operations to distract. Multiple sources here, one of the best comes from Powerline:

  1. Iran is trying to build a bomb and moving fast in those efforts. Who knows how long it will take, but the Manhattan project took us less than 4 years, starting from scratch and without computers or prior technology. Difficult to believe that it will take Iran (which has already been working on this program for a number of years) 10 more years to complete. I just have no faith that the Iranians are that dumb.
  
  2. Iran is a patron and has some level of control over Hamas.
  
  3. Iran has a close patron relationship with Hezbollah.
  
  4. Iran is a patron and supporter of the Taliban in Afghanistan.
  
  5. Iran supports and/or controls some of the Shiite insurgents in Iraq.
  
  6. North Korea is one of Iran's few friends and allies.
  
  7. Hamas and Hezbollah know that Israel must militarily react to the recent kidnaps and attacks and that their actions will ignite, at a minimum, a low level military conflict/incursion by Israel into the Gaza and Lebanon.
  
  8. Any military action by Israel will naturally to draw knee-jerk and harsh international criticism of Israel, regardless of the acts of the provoking parties.
  
  9. In spite of its embarrassing missile fizzle, North Korea knows that its July 4th stunt is extremely provocative to the United States.
  
  10. Higher gas prices (created in large part by the actions of Iran) have the American public and economy concerned.
  
  11. Constant low level violence in Iraq, and the eager air play given such violence in the American MSM, have created an anti-war mood in the U.S.
  
  11. Hezbollah's, Hamas's and North Korea's provocations have all occurred within a week of the date that the Iran situation is referred to the Security Council for what will likely be further endless hand wringing and inaction by that feckless organization.
  
  13. Only two countries have the military will (maybe) and capability (probably) to possibly stop Iran from moving forward with its nuclear program — Israel and the U.S.
  
  So here is my observation/theory — Iran has orchestrated much (if not all) of the current unrest and violence in order to: (i) distract attention from its nuclear weapons program, (ii) tie down Israel militarily in order to reduce the chances that Israel could unilaterally (or in combination with the U.S.) launch a preemptive strike on Iran's nuclear facilities, (iii) scare the American public (and politicians) into rejecting any unilateral military option against Iran for fear of further inflaming the Mideast (e.g., "Geez, we've already got huge issues in North Korea, Gaza, Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan, we can't possibly afford any further foreign entanglements" or "We better not do anything to Iran, we might further inflame the Mideast, threaten our oil supply and the U.S. economy" (Lord knows we don't want to pay $%/gallon for our SUV's)), and (iv) create world furor against Israel (and indirectly the U.S.), to further raise the stakes and international opposition to any unilateral military strikes.

  I'd add to that this thought: if, as this author asserts (and I believe) there are significant links between Tehran and the Taliban, and indeed it appears that Iran gave refuge to shattered Talibani forces after our intervention in Afghanistan, is it too much of a stretch to suggest that they're linked up with Al Qaeda? From there, is it again too much of a leap to suggest that along with the rest of their marionettes, they were behind the Mumbai bombings? I don't think I'm coming across as a conspiracy theorist here, just as a realist about the long, often discrete, reach of the mullahs.
• More on that theme from Leeden over at the National Review:

  It’s war, and it now runs from Gaza into Israel, through Lebanon and thence to Iraq via Syria. There are different instruments, ranging from Hamas in Gaza to Hezbollah in Syria and Lebanon and on to the multifaceted “insurgency” in Iraq. But there is a common prime mover, and that is the Iranian mullahcracy, the revolutionary Islamic fascist state that declared war on us 27 years ago and has yet to be held accountable.

  "You cannot escape the mullahs. You must either defeat them or submit to their terrible vision. There is no other way." Some might shy away from such apocalyptic language, but I believe he's hit the nail on the head. The whole article is worth reading.
  
• No doubt as a result of all of this, oil prices are nearing $76 a barrel. Even if it's not in Israel's best interests, I suspect the administration might try to hold them back in an attempt to keep oil from spiralling ever higher.

Lots more I could say now but I haven't even touched on the rest of the world, so I'll come back to the Middle East later.