** 3 PM UPDATE: TROLLING FOR TROOPS. U.S. Secretary of State Condi Rice will be trolling for more troops for Afghanistan to meet the challenge of the Taliban resurgence there when she meets with America’s NATO allies tomorrow in Brussels. But it doesn’t look like the Brits or anyone else will be making any announcements of new deployments, at least not right away.
Meanwhile, the government of Kyrgyzstan, the former Soviet republic which hosts the last remaining major US base in Central Asia, which is crucial to effort in Afghanistan, is in total disarray, with parliament having today rejected the president’s choice for prime minister for the second time in a row.
** U.S. AUGMENTS FORCE IN AFGHANISTAN. With the Taliban making a comeback in Afghanistan, aided by their safe haven in Pakistan, the US is augmenting its force structure in the mountainous country. As reported here last week, new Defense Secretary Bob Gates toured the country and came away promising to take the advice of commanders on meeting new needs in-country.
Here is the rather terse statement from the U.S. Department of Defense: The Department of Defense announced today Secretary of Defense Robert Gates approved a request from commanders to extend for up to 120 additional days 3,200 soldiers of the 3rd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division currently operating in Afghanistan. This extension will provide military capability for NATO to maintain the initiative and build upon the success achieved in promoting stability and security, while denying safe haven for the Taliban.
** LAW FIRM DROPS ANTI-JERRY BROWN LAWSUIT. You remember that lawsuit toward the end of the election, trying to disqualify former Governor Jerry Brown from being a candidate for or holding the office of California attorney general because he’d been an inactive member of the bar association? It didn’t go anywhere, of course, as predicted here, and Brown went on to crush conservative Republican Chuck Poochigian and was inaugurated as attorney general earlier this month.
The case did continue, in altered form. Now the law firm handling it has dropped out of the suit, leaving only the Contra Costa County Republican chairman, Tom Del Beccaro, coincidentally running for state vice chairman of the Republicany Party, handling his own case. It will be heard right before the state Republican convention next month. Coincidentally.
** HOLLYWOOD PRIMARY FOR DEMOCRATS? An early Hollywood primary of sorts in the Democratic presidential race will take place on February 20th. That’s when we see who shows at the Beverly Hilton Hotel for a big fundraiser for Barack Obama being thrown by longtime Clinton supporters Steven Spielberg, David Geffen, and Jeffrey Katzenberg. It’s hard to tell who will be there now because the invitations are just arriving. Here is the invitation. Only $2300 per person! Co-chairs, who sell 20 tickets, get a private dinner with Obama at David Geffen’s art-strewn home. Incidentally, that’s the night before the first candidates’ forum for the Nevada presidential caucuses, which will take place in Carson City (decidedly not to be confused with Beverly Hills).
** BUDGET WARNING SIGN FOR CALIFORNIA. Despite the great news in the poll for Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, there is something to give him and other state leaders pause. Income tax payments since December are substantially below projections. While corporate tax payments are up, it’s still a potential problem.
** Monitor computer memory prices on a daily basis. Prices are stable.
** NOON UPDATE: Crude oil prices have slid again, to the $53 to $54 per barrel level.
** Track global and national energy prices in near real time via Bloomberg. Crude oil prices have crept up to $55 per barrel on colder weather in the US and more kidnappings of oil workers in Nigeria.
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Is Hollywood abandoning Hillary?
I don’t know about Hollywood as a whole, but there’s definitely an affair with those guys. We’ll see if there’s a big split. You know how Hollywood marriages can go …
Is that enough troops for Afghanistan? Or is that all we can spare?
Probably not.
As I am going out the door to walk my dogs the CNN is reporting more ghastly violence in Iraq and the streets of Beirut…I have a very sad e-mail from a good girlfriend who has lived in Beirut all her adult life, she is now working with a Catholic relief agency…she said the Christian community is divided on their support between Hezbollah and Sinoria’s (who is a Sunni) government…the gov is viewed as very corrupt by many especially the poor…and the Hezbollah are of course seen as advocates for the disenfranchised…
If I wrote about all the trouble spots I would never leave the keyboard.
If that isn’t enough troops for Afghanistan where will they come from?
Not sure.
Foreign press reports have Rice calling a “hastily called meeting” for tomorrow that will ask NATO to match US…
Kevin Roiderick at L.A. Observed notes “Hillary Clinton will visit on Feb. 11 for meet-and-greets with donors at the homes of investment banker Sim Farar and industry mogul Haim Saban.” The turnout for this vs. the Obama affair should give us a better sense of how Hollywood is lining up…
If there was an Iranian army in Canada, and an Iranian army in Mexico, and Iran was pushing for regime change in the US, wouldn’t American policy be to keep those two Iranian armies tied down by insurgents in Canada and Mexico?—If for no other reason than to show the futility of invading North America?
I wonder how muc more than a flirtation Mr. Obama will engender from Hollywood.
We should’ve sent the “surge” 20k to Afghanistan. There are currently about 24k there, and it’s a small enough country that hiking that to 40k would give us the kind of troop-to-citizen ratios that have been traditionally understood to be necessary for making an occupation/reconstruction actually work.
Well, meet and greets are the not the same as parting with cold, hard cash, so I will find the Obama event at the Bev Hilton to be most interesting.
Sullihan — your point is taken, but such a scenario really points to the need for an Imperialistic application of the Monroe Doctrine. We need to establish a puppet regime in Ottawa to prevent such a nightmare scenario. I propose we call it “Operation Rough Rider,” in reference to the Godless heathens of the CFL. Damn them and their three downs!
Gosh! a little something for everybody tonight and tomorrow on Cspan! (times EST)
“C-SPAN Highlights
Tonight:
* C-SPAN Campaign Bus: “Talk of Iowa” Radio Program (8:20pm)
* Sen. Clinton (D-NY) Conference of Mayors Keynote Address (9:10pm)
* Senate Budget Cmte. Hearing on the 2007 CBO Report (9:45pm)
Tomorrow:
* U.S. House: Not In Session
* House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) on Iraq Policy (10am) – LIVE
* Pentagon Briefing from Afghanistan (11am) – LIVE
* Actor Gary Sinese on Memorial for Disabled American Veterans (1pm) – LIVE
* Nat’l Review Inst. Panel on the State of Conservatism (8pm) – LIVE”
**************************************
Why aren’t the conservatives yapping about Afghanistan?
some light in the tunnel!…Davos appears to be acting as an “icebreaker” to the “quartet approach” to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict…..and in Paris, Sinori’s government (Lebanon)is taking home promises/pledges of a ton of money from EU/US and Saudis to help him rebuild…that should keep him a float a while longer!
Well, we’ll see. Davos is a hothouse atmosphere — hence my sardonic allusion to the grotto at the Playboy Mansion.
True, it is a rarified hothouse …but at the same time t there have been some substantive alliances, programs, relationships etc…to spring from it …it has proved to be a great venue for advancing global warming and this year it actually looks like a Middle East Summit by attendees list!….and with the “quartet approach”…they can’t jump in the water anyway…has there will be much resistance… but Davos will give them a chance to dip in their toes!…
We better get some ,ore soldiers in there in Afghanistan or we will lose it.
It looks like we’ll have to have some cuts or taxes after all.
NWN:Kyrgyzstan, the former Soviet republic which hosts the last remaining major US base in Central Asia, which is crucial to effort in Afghanistan
You are so right…there are all these highly nuanced, delicate, connected, serious problems …and you think about how Cheney behaved yesterday during that CNN interview …so angry, defensive, and arrogant at every question pertaining to Iraq…and it really makes you nervous about this administration!…the Russians also have a base in Kyrgyzstan and they want to expand …this is yet another place where they can assert/insert themselves and make mischief…and you can bet they will utilize the death of “Aleksandr Ivanov, an ethnic Russian Kyrgyz citizen” at our airbase Manas to stir the pot…we have to be ready for anything and everything and somehow I do not think we are …at least Rumsfeld is gone…
There are so many crosscuts in play here.
Kyrgyzstan, for example, plays into the fight to hold Afghanistan, the fight against terrorist bases in the region, a foothold in the post-Soviet periphery, relations with a resurgent great power Russia, the shape and fate of Central Asia which is very much in play, and so forth.
Like most everything, it is not just one thing.
The yappers have had it with their Jerry Brown lawsuit finally?
There is an article in this morning’s WSJ that dovetails into the discussion ….In Davos, Ukraine’s PM announced that his country is “working to complete” a pipeline to carry the Caspian-region oil, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia, to EU…”to help diversify supplies so has EU is not solely dependent on Russia..
I like your use of the word “crosscuts” as a means to describe our very complex world..This administration obviously sees some of the “crosscuts”….but our world calls for much finer nimble minds than those in this ideological driven, somewhat paranoid,secretive administration.
“Crosscuts” is an old Gary Hart term.
It’s also one term (another is “slice”) commonly used to describe a single image from a CT or MRI scan, when you’re taking a series of them to build a 3D model.
Which is a pretty good analogy to what it means in the geopolitical context.
Well, he never told me THAT!