Former Secretary of State and Iraq Study Group co-chairman James Baker
discusses the ME with Ali G.
** ADVANTAGE JOHN EDWARDS AS OBAMA TRIES TO MATCH HILLARY AS A TRIANGULATOR? That’s what Dick Morris, the quirky yet brilliant longtime Bill Clinton guru-turned-Hillary Clinton-hater-and-Fox News commentator seems to think. He thinks the second term U.S. senator and former first lady still has the edge for the Democratic presidential nomination.
But he sees Edwards as running in the open field with his clearcut opposition to the Iraq War. The former North Carolina senator and 2004 Democratic vice presidential nominee leads all the polls I have seen from the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses. And although Hillary leads in the private polling I’ve seen from second-in-the-nation Nevada, I know from also having done Nevada that an attractive and articulate trend presidential candidate, which Edwards is, can sweep to victory in the Silver State. And that is without factoring in the union support that Edwards will have in the Las Vegas market, which should comprise about 70% of the Democratic vote in Nevada come next January 19th.
** AFGHANISTAN COMMITMENT COMING UP SHORT. Secretary of State Condi Rice gave a strong pitch today at the NATO meeting in Brussels for more troops and more aid to Afghanistan. Citing an anticipated “bloody spring offensive” by the Taliban, the former Stanford University provost came away with no firm commitments for new military forces from the NATO allies, who in turn were looking for more of a commitment from the US, fearing that America was fatefully preoccupied with the collapsed policy in Iraq. Rice said that the Bush Administration will seek another $10.6 billion — a tiny fraction of what is being spent on Iraq — from Congress in training and equipment for the Afghan Army and financial aid for the government. Defense Secretary Bob Gates yesterday announced that several thousand American light infantry troops would find their deployments in Afghanistan extended to meet the threat of the resurgent Taliban, who appear to have a safe haven in the form of America’s putative ally in the Terror War, Pakistan.
Nevertheless, no firm commitments of more troops from NATO allies has been forthcoming. Of the more than 42,000 US and NATO troops in Afghanistan, 24,000 are Americans. In fact, the European Union will actually cut its level of financial aid to the Afghan government.
** PETRAEUS CONFIRMED BY SENATE. Army Lieutenant General David Petraeus has just been confirmed by the U.S. Senate as America’s new commander in Iraq. The vote was 81-0.
** OIL UP TO $55 PER BARREL. The price of crude oil has jumped up to $55 per barrel on colder weather in much of the US — the spring-like weather last month in New York City has turned to an arctic chill — and an OPEC production cut next week. What does this do to the theory that Saudi Arabia was working to pressure Iran by keeping oil prices lower?
** NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH GENERAL JACK D. RIPPER. America’s new commander in Iraq, anointed by President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to save their scalded bacon, is Lieutenant General David Petraeus. (For the uninitiated, that means he wears three stars.) Some on the left, given the avidity with which this appointment has been greeted by many war hawks, seem to think Petraeus is some sort of yee-haw figure out of Dr. Strangelove.
Actually, he is not. Petraeus is a warrior/scholar, a paratrooper with a PhD. from Princeton who is friendly with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. He is also the principal author of America’s new counter-insurgency doctrine, which can be viewed here. As you will see, the Petraeus doctrine can be described as high-intensity community policing. Can it work in Iraq? Are there enough troops in the “surge” that is really a slow-rolling wave? Is the situation — one part insurgency, one part sectarian war, one part externally-directed (from Iranian elements) attack on American forces, one part a piece of a larger Al Qaeda design — too far gone for these techniques?
** THE WESTLY GROUP AND KLEINER PERKINS. Back on January 9th, in this NWN video and column, former California state Controller Steve Westly, the ex-eBay honcho who ran a near miss campaign for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination, laid out his future plans. Invest in and foster new greentech firms and run a political action committee with an eye to a future race for governor or senator. Since then, he’s further concretized those plans, establishing the Westly Group as a Silicon Valley venture capital firm. The Westly Group is housed in the offices of Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield, and Byers, perhaps the most important venture capital firm in America. But, contrary to a press report, Westly is not on the board of Kleiner Perkins. For one thing, as he notes, Kleiner Perkins doesn’t have a board. For another, the relationship is more of a strategic alliance.
** A TEAM ARNOLD SHIFT. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger‘s very able and well-liked campaign press secretary, Julie Soderlund, a deputy press secretary in the Governor’s Office before that, is shifting to the private side with Wilson-Miller Communications. Wilson being Schwarzenegger’s finance chief, Marty Wilson, and Miller being former Governor Pete Wilson’s former spokeswoman Beth Miller. But even though she’s brand new to the private sector, Soderlund already has her very own first client. It’s Schwarzenegger’s political committee. The new Team Arnold committee doesn’t have a name as yet. NWN will be suggesting one.
** TAUSCHER REMOVED FROM TARGET LIST. There’s been a fair amount of lefty blogosphere chatter about Bay Area Congresswoman Ellen Tauscher becoming the “new Joe Lieberman,” i.e., a target for removal in a Democratic primary. (Not that Lieberman got removed in the end.) Why? Because she’s something of a DLC type, has a chummy photo with George W. Bush, one of her advisors said mean things about lefty bloggers, etc. The folks who’ve been pushing this notion on the Net are largely a relatively small crew who used to try to swarm NWN, insisting that Phil Angelides was really a great candidate for governor of California and was really doing much better than I reported. (Actually, he was sometimes doing worse than I reported, but I don’t like kicking a dead horse every day.) It didn’t seem like a very big deal, especially since, when I asked, they couldn’t produce the name of a credible opponent.
Then a new labor/liberal outfit emerged to keep Democrats on the straight and narrow, i.e., left-liberal path. They put Tauscher at the top of a hit list. That seemed more serious.
But not for long. She’s off the list. It seems that everyone forgot something rather important, which I’m sure I mentioned at one point. Tauscher is part of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi‘s leadership team, as a regional Democratic whip in the Congress. I know Nancy Pelosi. She comes out of machine politics in Maryland. She is not going to allow a member of her leadership team to be defeated in a Democratic primary. Even if she deserves to be.
** IRAQ STUDY GROUP INFLUENCE. Anyone who thinks that the much-maligned-from-the-right-wing Iraq Study Group is not influencing the Iraq policy already is quite mistaken. This article for the Atlantic by writer Robert Kaplan, whose work anticipated the current post-Cold War, post-modern chaos in much of the world, points up what I’ve been hinting at, that in fact the ISG is quite influential, even now at what seems to be the moment of President George W. Bush‘s defiance of his defeat in the November elections, the acknowledged collapse of his Iraq policy, and overwhelming polling numbers against him.
The Iraq “Surrender” Group, as some of the quite fragrant right-wing critics have called it — bear in mind, as the ahistorical do not, that it contains two-thirds of the troika that ran the Ronald Reagan White House during the winning of the Cold War — called for a modest surge of US troops into Iraq to try to tame an out-of-control security situation. That’s what is happening. It suggested that this be a plan for this year. That’s what it seems to be. It called for an Iraq reconstruction plan. That’s what Bush is proposing. It called for a renewed Israeli/Palestinian peace process. Bush is pushing that.
It also called for engagement with Iran and Syria on Iraq. Which Bush says he won’t do. Now. But his team says they will engage with a more amenable Iran. Which serious economic pressure and the dispatch of a second aircraft carrier battle group to the Persian Gulf may well produce. Of course, Bush himself did meet with the leader of a pro-Iranian faction in the Iraqi Parliament. Meanwhile, the British have been talking. And so has the Iraqi government we support. They apparently can’t have enough summits in Tehran.
** Monitor computer memory prices on a daily basis. Prices are relatively stable.
** Track global and national energy prices in near real time via Bloomberg. Crude oil prices are around $53 to $54 per barrel. Record heat in New York has given way to record cold.
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“Iran doesn’t sound like Iraq.” Too much.
We’ll end up following Baker/Hamilton unless we invade Iran.
Kaplan/Atlanic Online”What if the Iranians watch our beefed-up naval and air presence, combined with increasing economic pressure on them, and say, so what? That’s where the partial and tenuous overlap between what the Baker-Hamilton report advised we should do, and what neoconservatives say we might do under better circumstances, evaporates. That’s where it may come down to a confrontation between Vice President Dick Cheney and the Gates-Fallon team at the Pentagon, which is essentially the Baker-Hamilton team.”
I recently read this…it’s a great piece!…Thank you for posting it.
Obviously, Iran is NOT saying “so what” as the recent attacks by the Ayatollah on President A. show…also Congress has embraced the ISG …and Condi’s announcement that this administration is open to the “Quartet Approach” to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict again echoes the ISG…Between Cheney inner workings of his office going public via Libby trial and his disturbing appearance on CNN (I almost fell out of my chair with his arrogant and stupid “Wolf, that’s not going to happen” response) I am hoping even if he stays VP he will be somewhat distanced from crucial decision-makin…
I don’t think the US is going to invade Iran.
Well, you know, my friend Michael Ledeen, who erroneously reported that Ayatollah Khameni died early this month, thinks everything seemingly happening inside Iran is for show, to throw us off the scent.
Gosh everyone check out Speaker Nunez at California Majority Report from DAVOS!
“I rubbed elbows with the likes of the prime minister of Kuwait, the president of OPEC, and energy secretaries from nations such as Chile, Japan, the United Arab Emirates, and Mexico. I also shared a table with the president of Azerbaijan — not too shabby for a kid who grew up on the wrong side of the tracks in San Diego.”
You know I read last night in The Economist” Davos blog that the Russians after disappearing for a few years from Davos are back BIG TIME this is year!…now I really like our Speaker and I want him back here with us …so he has to be careful because I am sure Mr. Maviglio is a very nice and bright person…but let’s face it …Maviglio is NO JACK BAUER! Go Nunez!
I know, I saw that. Fabian is quite wide-eyed, isn’t he?
I would have to comment on that if I made it an item.
>Gosh everyone check out Speaker Nunez at California Majority Report from DAVOS!
“I rubbed elbows with the likes of the prime minister of Kuwait, the president of OPEC, and energy secretaries from nations such as Chile, Japan, the United Arab Emirates, and Mexico. I also shared a table with the president of Azerbaijan — not too shabby for a kid who grew up on the wrong side of the tracks in San Diego.”
Ali G is da best.
But then Ledeen would say that…wouldn’t he?…the neocons have a new angle to work …justifying the actions of former Defense Iran Desk Franklin’s actions…especially before yet another upcoming high profile trial this spring …so you will see a relentless beat of the war drum from all of them…It is very curious, as I went to the PJ roll out party in NY…it was presented to me as it’s focus was to be a cutting edge News wire (AP like)service …after the way the Ledeen announcement of the “Death of the Ayatollah” was handled …I never use its as a news source…I can’t imagine anyone else seriously using it either…
I don’t know much about the Franklin affair. What is that?
wide eyed is better than smug and cyncial…he has a good mind, and it says alot about him in a positive way that he grabbed this opportunity to go when it became available…I bet they are heading into the “American Dinner” with DiFi, and to hear McCain and Kerry speak right now!
BTW theArmy 10th Mountain Div General is answering questions on Afghan-Taliban on C-span right now LIVE
The speaker doesn’t exactly get a bad press here.
I am on the run and trying to listen to C-span Google 2 words:
“Franklin AIPAC”
The trial is scheduled for this spring …it has been postponed twice to my knowledge but it is going forward …although Mr Ledeen recently told one of his posters that it would not happen…who knows why he would say that…who knows why he says anything he says.
“The speaker doesn’t exactly get a bad press here’
AGREE! you are fair to everyone! You report all sides! Which make you quite unique! Toodles!
Franklin AIPAC?
Here is a new name for the Schwarzeneger committee. The Socialist Squad. lol
I need to clarify something as it may seem as I was being unduly provocative in what I wrote above (not about Neocons but the upcoming trial)…The trial I mentioned has become for better or worse is known/referenced as the “Aipac trial” in people’s conversations and in some press reports.
This of course has all the anti-Semites and anti-Israel individuals and groups biting at the bit for its start…I hope we have the trial and that all decent intelligent people push back at the anti-Semites and anti Israel crowd because they certainly will raise their ugly heads …however, this trial is important because like the LIBBY trial is providing a unique window into the VP’s office …this trial could shed a great deal of info on Douglas Feith’s office and how he operated ..because if some of the reporting is correct (Frontline, a piece in Rolling Stone) Feith’s office ran an operation to similar in style to Iran some Contra goings-on for my taste… ….
oops… Ledeen was wrong again…the trial is going to happen…
“The judge in the classified information case against two former AIPAC staffers set a June 4 trial date.
Judge T.S. Ellis of the U.S. District Court in Eastern Virginia set the date Thursday. The trial date is three months shy of three years since Steve Rosen, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s former foreign policy chief, and Keith Weissman, its top Iran analyst, were made aware of the case when FBI agents raided AIPAC offices on Aug. 27 2004, and almost two years after their August 2005 indictment. AIPAC fired the two men in March 2005.”
Still pretty murky what that is about.
Not so surprising …Feith ran a murky office but unfortunately there is a risk everyone will only focus on AIPAC…in my humble opinion that would be a mistake…the starting point is Feith’s office …
Where to begin with all this material?
Gen. Petraeus is brilliant. It is unfortunate he will never be able to test his theories in Iraq.
start by reading Karen U. Kwiatkowski
I think the idea is to make comments accessible to readers of the forum, not assign homework.
Sorry! You are of course right as always….
but has you said it’s really murky out there Mr. Bradley !…i.e.,unless we are reading you!
Except for one thing. I’m not writing about it. If you want to make the point, make the point.
That’s true.. it was your mentioneing of Ledeen that got me thinking about all this…interesting enough he is a significant part of the Feith/(Larry Franklin)AIPAC Trial story…i.e., if you start the story at Feith…which of course is wher eit should start..(in my humble opinion)…
Is Dan Weintraub the most boring wonk writer in California? lol
Now if you are still confused…I shall elaborate a little bit more because it is not my style to appear coy…
A subordinate of Douglas Feith,(DOD, Office of Special Plans) Larry Franklin, was convicted, and sentenced to 12 years in prison by the FEDS in 2005 for charges in the AIPAC Espionage scandal. Larry Franklin (Headed the Iran Dept) was accused, and convicted, of passing classified information to an Israeli diplomat and Rosen & Weissman, an employees of the AIPAC lobby. (Weissman headed the Iran Desk) Depending on what you read ( and some is intelligent speculation, and some conspiracy nonsense) The ongoing FBI espionage-counter intelligence probe into improper transmission of classified information to AIPAC from 1999 to shortly before the 2003 Iraq Invasion could involve Feith. Franklin officially worked six layers of bureaucracy beneath Feith. However, while leading the INFAMOUS Office of Special Plans Feith used Larry Franklin repeatedly for sensitive meetings involving foreign citizens, i.e., Israelis and Iranian dissidents, overseas including at least one in Italy with Dr. Ledeen certain Iranian who some will remember from Iran-Gate…It is “rumored” that Franklin is going to cooperate and testify in the upcoming trial of Rosen and Weissman….
Here’s what I think after reading various Neo Cons and their sympathizers the last two weeks …The necocons have worked out their talking points…(1)scare the MSM that “sources” will dry up if Rosen and Weissman are convicted, as such, making the MSM sympathetic to the cause or inhibiting the MSM from writing about this at all….(2) call people who pursue the link to Feith and Co., anti Israel …anti Semites..(3)beat the warpath of Evil Iran so that Franklin looks like a hero…All this is for one purpose only …to keep the spotlight off of Feith and his office and mandate of that office ……WHY???? because if you look closely and critically …this story has the look and feel of Iran-Contra …that is because they are SIBLINGS …only this time the neo-cons did not start a little war (Contra) they started a BIG WAR, Iraq…
Thank for clarifying your points, as it were.
Your welcome Mr. Bradley
Have a good weekend everybody!
Here’s the C-span highlights:!!!
(times EST)
National Review Panel on the State of Conservatism (8pm) – LIVE
Sat
LIVE
* United for Peace & Justice Anti-War Rally (11am) – LIVE
Sunday:
* Road to the White House: Sen. Clinton (D-NY) & Rudi Giuliani (6:30pm)
Monday:
* Discussion on Chinese Anti-Satellite Weapons (12pm) – LIVE
* U.S. House: In Session (2pm) – LIVE
**********************************************************************
C-SPAN 2 Highlights
Friday:
* Discussion with Israeli Deputy P.M. & Palestinian President (8pm)
* Discussion on CIA Activities in Europe (8:50pm)
Monday:
* Pentagon Briefing from Iraq (9am) – LIVE
* Palestine Center Discussion on Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (1pm) – LIVE
* U.S. Senate: In Session (2pm) -
We’re losing Afghanistan. It isn’t bad enough we screwed up in Iraq, we are losing Afghanistan.
Isn’t edwards too left to get elected?
Nope.
A good analysis of Edwards’ chances, at least in California:
Edwards Could Benefit Most from California February Primary
by Randy Shaw
http://www.beyondchron.org/articles/Edwards_Could_Benefit_Most_from_California_February_Primary_4117.html
“As each week seems to bring a new stream of presidential candidate announcements, a deal is brewing in Sacramento that could greatly impact the race. The deal would move California’s presidential primary to February, when the state’s residents are so unaccustomed to voting that it will place a premium on the candidate with the best voter mobilization and outreach machine. Organized labor is the name of the game in California’s Democratic primaries, and many unions, and SEIU and UNITEHERE in particular, are closely aligned with John Edwards. Edwards could be the chief beneficiary of an earlier date…”
Shaw points out that Edwards could also win Nevada primary/caucus with strong Hotel union support.
Labor isn’t really the name of the game in a California Presidential primary. The writer, like most bloggers, is generalizing from recent narrow experience.
Karen Kwiatkowski is the LewRockwell.com and Pat Buchanan’s magazine (The American Conservative) writer who accused the Pentagon of wanting to “build greater Zion” and complained that “[w]hat seemed out of place was the strong and open pro-Israel and anti-Arab orientation in an ostensibly apolitical policy-generation staff within the Pentagon.”
Oh yeah, and her big story was broken by Jeff Steinberg (editor of LaRouche’s Executive Intelligence Review).
Seems like she might have a few issues with Israel, and maybe, just maybe, isn’t the sort of person you want to use as a neutral source.
Well, that sounds pretty darn questionable, doesn’t it?
“Karen Kwiatkowski is the LewRockwell.com and Pat Buchanan’s magazine…”
You forgot to mention “The New Pentagon Papers” at Salon.com. Karen Kwiatkowski, is interesting because she was a Desk Officer in Feith’s Policy organization. It’s clear she did not like him or approve of him,and she has become controversial. She asserts due to the efforts of people to smear her. She has publicly denied in writing (a letter issued to various members of congress which can be found on the web) that she has any connection to LaRouche…She was a registered Republican she is now a Libertarian. She has been accused of being anti-Israel, I have not examined all her writing … however, that charge was recently lauched at Jim Baker when the Baker/Hamilton published the “Iraq Study Group” his accusers appear to be basing the charge (which is actually not a new one) to the recommendations for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict offered up in the ISG!….you don’t like Karen? ..so don’t read her!…it is not like there are not other sources out there, e.g., like James Bramford’s well researched article in Rolling Stone last summer “THE NEXT WAR …IRAN”. Should you read with a critical eye? .. well yeah! …but doesn’t that apply to all reading?
One of the “Kos kidz” collected and annotated (noting which party was generally on which side, stuff like that) every single vote on which Sens Clinton and Edwards disagreed in 2001, and has future editions coming to contrast them in other years; I believe there are Clinton/Obama charts in the works as well.
At a glance, the 2001 record would put Edwards very slightly to Clinton’s right.
Personally, if the first four races are is IA, NH, NV, and SC, I think Edwards wins IA, NV, and SC, with Hillary in second in NV and Obama in second in SC. This seems very favorable to Edwards.
If CA moves up to February, though, I suspect either Obama or Hillary will win here, and that would put it back into being a real three-way race.
Either way, it’s going to be an interesting election.
California is moving up.
I just noted your announcement of David Petraeus’ appointment to the Iraqi command. He is one of the few commanders to get good notices in Tom Rick’s book “Fiasco”, and Rick Atkinson gives him the nod in his book “In the Company of Soldiers.” One of the impressive things about him is that he seems to understand the difference between conventional and unconventional warfare. Many conventional soldiers, even in the US Army today, don’t understand the difference, think that all wars just involve finding the enemy, pinning him, and then closing to finish him off. Counterinsurgencies, by contrast, *are* more susceptible to things like Community Policing. It sounds silly, of course…doing something like this against Saddam in 91 wouldn’t have worked at all. Problem is, if all armed conflict is the same, then the LAPD should be armed with Abrams tanks, Bradley fighting vehicles, and Apache helicopters. They’d never take casualties, and there would be a lot of dead gangbangers. There would also be a lot of collateral damage, of course, and while it’s regrettable in conventional warfare, collateral damage can be fatal in a counterinsurgency. In such a war, attacking the enemy consists of getting water running, the phones and the lights working, and the streets safe. If that happens, the clowns who want to set up IEDs or take a pot shot at the occupying troops will be pointed out by the locals pronto. If we’re going to win the war in Iraq, it’s not going to be because we deployed more, or fewer troops, it’s going to be because the ones we already have there have learned to fight the insurgency, and not the insurgents themselves.