Last week, before the weekend ambush of Turkish soldiers that
set troops taking up positions on the Iraqi border, the leader of Iraq’s
Kurdish separatists discusses his movement’s resolve.
** SOCAL FIRE UPDATE: HELP FROM THE PENTAGON ARRIVES TOMORROW. Defense Secretary Bob Gates swiftly approved Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s request below, directing six aircraft with Modular Airborne Fire Fighting Systems (MAFFS) units to help fight the burgeoning Southern California fires.
The MAFFS is a self-contained reusable 3,000 gallon aerial fluid dispersal system that attaches to C-130 aircraft. The aircraft are coming to California from bases in Colorado, Wyoming, and North Carolina.
** SCHWARZENEGGER ASKS PENTAGON FOR HELP WITH SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA FIRES. Well, this isn’t going very well. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has just formally asked US Secretary of Defense Bob Gates for assistance from the Department of Defense in fighting the burgeoning Southern California fires.
I am writing to request your assistance with the delivery of all available Modular Airborne Fire Fighting Systems (MAFFS) to assist California in our fight against the fires raging in Southern California. The proliferation in the number of fires that have engulfed Southern California requires the immediate use of all available MAFFS to assist in this emergency.
Your immediate assistance is necessary to deploy Department of Defense aircraft located in Wyoming, North Carolina and Colorado to assist California in our firefighting effort. At this time, we have had to evacuate more than 250,000 residents from their homes in the San Diego and Malibu areas. These fires have also scorched thousands of acres in both mountainous and urban areas across Southern California, with many structures burned and thousands more at risk.
It is only with the full support and assistance of your office that we can bring these fires under control and protect Californians from even more despair and destruction.
** SCHWARZENEGGER CALLS OUT NATIONAL GUARD TO FIGHT SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA FIRES. After touring several sites of now raging Southern California fires, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called out the National Guard to help in the firefighting effort.
1500 National Guard personnel will join the fight, including 200 who have been serving along the Mexican border as part of President Bush’s fairly ineffectual border interdiction effort.
“It is a tragic time for California. I saw the tremendous devastation caused by these fires first hand today and I want to commend all of the brave firefighters that have been battling the blazes around our state. They have done an extraordinary job,” said Schwarzenegger in a statement. “We have the best-trained, the best-equipped and the most experienced firefighters in the world and I am committed to making all of the state’s resources available to them to get these fires under control. That is why I have declared a state of emergency and directed the National Guard to support the firefighters in Southern California.
“I urge everyone to follow the directions and evacuation orders issued by the emergency personnel.”
Some 250,000 households, mostly in the San Diego area, have been warned through the reverse 911 system to evacuate. That amounts to roughly 500,000 people. Schwarzenegger said earlier this afternoon that 250,000 had actually evacuated.
Schools in the Malibu and LA coastal canyon areas will remain closed at least through tomorrow. A new large fire front is threatening the Lake Arrowhead resort area well east of Los Angeles.
** A FEW ANNOUNCEMENTS. A few fairly new items moving forward.
I’ve become a senior fellow of the USC Annenberg School for Communication with its Knight Digital Media Center. My particular interest, as you might suppose, is in how best to cover and explain politics in the globalized Digital Age. Politics is changing, technology is changing, journalism is changing, and the media is changing.
I’m also a co-host and commentator on a show on XM Satellite Radio. PJM Political is on POTUS08, Channel 130 on the burgeoning national network. As the designator POTUS (President Of The United States) indicates, the show is about presidential politics. The show airs several times a week, beginning at 6 PM Thursdays for East Coast drive time.
In addition, there have been a few changes of late with New West Notes, which you have probably noticed.
For one, the video packages have increased. The intent is to further illustrate U.S. presidential campaign coverage and international crisis and trend coverage that affects presidential politics.
In addition, anticipating some major moves out of Moscow in early October, at that time I added a daily live link on NWN to the new Russia Today TV news channel. No endorsement of the views expressed on RT, which provides interesting and fast-paced international coverage unavailable on US TV outlets but is owned and operated by the state news agency of this re-emerging global power, is intended.
There will be more developments. The traditional emphasis on California political analysis and coverage continues. And updates and analysis continue throughout the day on NWN.
** SCHWARZENEGGER TOURS SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA FIRE SCENES. Having scrapped his original schedule for Monday and declared a state of emergency for virtually all of Southern California, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is touring the fire scenes in the Los Angeles and San Diego areas. This has become a major crisis — see earlier item below.
Over 250,000 people have been evacuated in the northern San Diego County area. The Los Angeles Daily News, which is very widely read in LA’s San Fernando Valley, went essentially unpublished today with the fire threat to its principal printing plant in the Santa Clarita Valley.
** REPUBLICANS FINALLY MOVE AGAINST ROGUE STATES.The Republican Party is, according to AP, moving to strip half the delegates from five rogue states moving their contests up ahead of the party’s schedule for the presidential nomation contest. They are New Hampshire, Wyoming, Michigan, South Carolina, and Florida. It’s interesting that New Hampshire is in the group, since the Granite State has not yet set its primary date.
Democrats moved many weeks ago, and with far more harsh tactics.
This set off a round of intense diplomatic efforts. Turkey’s foreign minister meets tomorrow in Baghdad with the Iraqi leadership in a bid to get Iraqi forces to rein in the Kurdish separatist rebels operating in their country. An Iraq delegation is also said to be going to Turkey.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan will meet with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown tomorrow on the crisis. Erdogan will also meet with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in London later in the day.
The Turks are showing that they are willing to go the extra mile under extreme provocation before launching a major cross-border incursion. Time is running out for an Iraqi solution to the crisis.
Meanwhile, the misbegotten anti-Turkey resolution by Congressional Democrats, condemning the country for brutal actions taken against Armenians by the late Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago, which was championed last week by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, looks dead.
** ARNOLD SCRAPS MONDAY SCHEDULE ON ACCOUNT OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA FIRE CRISIS. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has scrapped his planned schedule of events on Monday to monitor the fire crisis sweeping across Southern California. Schwarzenegger has declared a state of emergency for San Diego, Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, Santa Barbara and Ventura counties.
While property loss and loss of life has been limited thusfar, a confluence of unusual weather conditions make the situation very threatening. The state’s drought conditions have joined with the traditional risky pattern of development, high temperatures, and unusually strong and persistent Santa Ana winds to create a potential tinder box situation.
In LA, temperatures are expected to top 100 degrees by the middle of this week. On the weekend, rain is expected. Spooky weather.
** HILLARY’S WESTERN SCHEDULE. As mentioned in the Monday Morning Quarterback, Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton is spending three days on a Western tour. Yesterday she held a “Winning In The West” rally and meetings in Las Vegas, then hit LA last night for a fundraiser at director Rob Reiner’s house, where guests serenaded her with a rendition of “Happy Birthday.” (The former first lady turns 60 on Friday.)
Reiner is re-emerging through Hillary’s campaign after essentially disappearing from the political scene after being confronted by NWN at a luncheon speech with previously undisclosed documents from his late tenure as head of California’s children and families commission.
Today, Clinton has a morning rally in Fresno. Then she’s in the San Francisco Bay Area for a fundraiser. Tonight, she has a fundraiser in the Seattle area and attends the state Democrats’ annual awards dinner.
On Tuesday, she has a fundraiser in Denver and a big rally in downtown Denver.
On Wednesday, she is back in Iowa.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia is fast re-emerging as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is quite interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window. Moscow time is 11 hours ahead of Pacific time.
While the other presidential candidates in both parties take aim
at her, Hillary Clinton takes aim at President George W. Bush.
Judging from Sunday night’s Republican debate, and the criticisms coming from Democrats, right now the presidential race is mostly about Hillary Clinton. Whose birthday is this week. She turns 60 on October 26th. Look for the glitterati of New York and LA to have a field day.
George W. Bush, with near record levels of unpopularity, scarcely gets a mention these days from the Republicans seeking to replace him. But the wife of his Democratic predecessor certainly does. Even resurgent Russia, target of some recycled Cold War rhetoric, gets more mention.
The Republican race is in a phase in which the leading candidates are trying to shore up appeals to more conservative elements in the Republican base vote. The effort comes with most of the top candidates having shaky bona fides in that regard. Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney have both been moderate to liberal on social and other issues, and Giuliani hasn’t changed his positions. John McCain has been more consistently conservative, except on immigration, campaign finance, and the environment, but he’s faded from his leadership position. Fred Thompson has under-wowed as a candidate. Mike Huckabee stirs the hearts of social conservatives with his traditional views on their issues, but hasn’t been able to raise money.
Rudy Giuliani, who has done the best in the Republican debates, told a conference of social conservatives on Saturday in Washington not to fear him. He would appoint conservative Supreme Court justices, he said, seeking common ground by citing his devout Catholic schoolboy past. But he didn’t back away from his pro-choice stance, and scored rival Mitt Romney for changing his positions.
Last night’s debate in Florida was the first big event since the candidates appeared Friday and Saturday before a conference of social conservatives in Washington. Mike Huckabee was the favorite of the crowd. Mitt Romney narrowly won a straw poll. Fred Thompson reportedly disappointed, and finished fourth in the straw poll. Rudy Giuliani tried to assuage concerns without changing his views.
So the candidates are attacking one another, and promising to be the best to go after Hillary. Who simply drives many Republicans wild. Which makes it a good strategy to try to stir up Republican voters, who polls show are much less satisfied with their candidates than are the Democrats.
With Clinton in the lead, her Democratic rivals are going after her, too. Which makes sense, as we learned last week that she has the most money.
We’re learning more about the campaign finance picture in the presidential race. The Democratic candidates are in much better shape than their Republican counterparts. In the vital area of cash on hand, Hillary Clinton leads on the Democratic side while Rudy Giuliani leads on the Republcian side.
On the Republican side, Rudy Giuliani has $11.2 million cash on hand to Mitt Romney’s $9.2 million, Fred Thompson’s $7.1 million, and John McCain’s $3.5 million. The libertarian Texas Congressman Ron Paul, an asterisk in the polls, has $5.4 million.
On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton has $35 million to Barack Obama’s $32 million, John Edwards’ $10 million, and Bill Richardson’s $5 million.
Edwards is going after Hillary for ties to lobbyists, and is expanding his attack now to her questionable fundraising, notably to date from the Asian-American community. Her campaign has already had to return $850,000 raised by disgraced political fundraiser Norman Hsu, who is suspected of using straw man contributors to launder money into campaigns. Now it looks like many of her Asian contributors in New York are questionable as well.
Meanwhile, for her part, Hillary is campaigning against Bush, launching a new TV ad campaign called “Trapdoor,” arguing that Bush and the Republicans have brought a new era of economic insecurity to America.
She’s continuing her theme of change, which she’s done a good job of at least partially coopting from Obama and Edwards, by emphasizing her standing as the first major woman candidate.
And this week she spends several days campaigning in the West, a major opportunity area for Democrats, going up and down the West Coast and hitting Nevada and Colorado. She has some general election problems in the Mountain West, which her campaign wants to begin to address.
Giuliani will continue his emphasis on Florida, a key early state now for Republicans — though not for Democrats, who are honoring Democratic rules against its move into the first group of contests — and Thompson is spending two days there to try to cut into Giuliani’s lead there.
All the Republican candidates are likely to participate in a senior citizens forum in Iowa. …
What went up did come down. And not nearly so well as this
launch. The Soyuz spacecraft had a difficult return today from
the International Space Station, coming down over 200 miles
off-course, subjecting its occupants to high-stress G forces.
** FIRST REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE FOLLOWING THE APPEAL TO CHRISTIAN RIGHT. Sunday night at 5 PM Pacific time, the Republican presidential field has another 90-minute debate on Fox News. It’s the first big event since the candidates appeared Friday and Saturday before a conference of social conservatives in Washington. Mike Huckabee was the favorite of the crowd. Mitt Romney narrowly won a straw poll. Fred Thompson reportedly disappointed, and finished fourth in the straw poll. Rudy Giuliani tried to assuage concerns without changing his views.
More worrisome than the very off-course landing is the manner of the landing. The Soyuz came down at a very steep angle. Travelers normally experience four times the force of earth gravity during re-entry to the Earth’s atmosphere. Today’s trio experienced 8 Gs.
On Russian television, a former cosmonaut, rather amusingly using a small model of an American Apollo space capsule held in his hand, depicted what he called a “ballistic” landing rather than a “controlled” landing.
The space authorities themselves haven’t explained what led to this “ballistic,” i.e., nearly out of control, landing.
** SPECTACULAR CONCLUSION TO F1 SEASON. In a sensational and surprising conclusion to the Formula One racing season with this morning’s Brazilian Grand Prix, Ferrari driver Kimi Raikonnen of Finland won the race and the world driver’s championship, by a mere one point over British rookie Lewis Hamilton, the first black driver in F1, who’d led most of the 17-race season. Two-time defending champion Fernando Alonso of Spain was third in the race and tied Hamilton in the season points, but finished third on a tie-breaker.
F1 is the world’s second most popular sport, behind soccer (known outside of America as football).
Hamilton qualified second on the grid yesterday, just behind Raikonnen’s Ferrari teammate Felipe Massa, a Brazilian, but Rakonnen caught him on the first turn of the first lap. Then Hamilton made a rookie mistake, allowing Alonso also to catch him on the first lap, then trying to block him from going by. Which he didn’t actually need to do, given the championship points situation. But the time he’d sorted himself out on the first lap, Hamilton was way back in seventh. Which is where he ultimately finished.
Hamilton tried to get back into contention but suffered a gear box problem which dropped him to thirteenth. When that was sorted out, he was ready for a late charge, but he was too far behind.
Meanwhile, the two Ferrari drivers raced away from defending champion Alonso. Raikonnen passed Massa, probably by arrangement late in the race, since Massa was out of the running for the overall world championship.
So the flying Finn, who has frequently seemed the fastest of all the drivers but suffered from balky machinery and bad luck, won the world title in his first season at Ferrari. In his first season replacing the legendary Michael Schumacher, who seven-time world champion status had been displaced the last two years by Alonso.
While Raikonnen finally found enough luck to win his probably overdue championship, Hamilton’s misfortunes cost him his. Hamilton did have the greatest rookie season in F1 history. But his loss for the widely expected championship was the third in a series of big sports disappointments for Britain in the last few days. On Thursday, the Russian national football (soccer) team beat England in Moscow for the first time since the Soviet days in a key international match. On Saturday, England lost to South Africa in the rugby world championship final in Paris. And Sunday, the Brit’s new race driving sensation came up short in Sao Paolo.
Sunday’s Grand Prix of Brazil sets up an unprecedented battle
for the Formula One world championship in the last race of the
season between McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso
and Ferrari’s Kimi Raikonnen. Here Ferrari’s Felipe Massa makes
pole position last year around the stunning Interlagos circuit.
** QUICK HITS. The California health care reform conundrum continues. The state labor federation wrapped up 48 hours of protest outside Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s gubernatorial offices around the state. The effort is an attempt to back Schwarzenegger off his proposed mandate for all Californians to have health insurance, which Schwarzenegger says is necessary to balance the risk pool, and to increase health care subsidies and tax business more heavily. Turnouts, according to sources in both parties, were low. Nevertheless, if labor stays away, there’s no compromise. The two sides are sniping, rather desultorily as it happens, in various press releases, with relatively little press attention at this late date. … Former Governor-turned-Attorney General Jerry Brown will sue the Bush Administration next week to force its approval of California’s landmark 2002 law cutting tailpipe emissions of greenhouse gases. … In Hollywood, the Writers Guild voted to authorize a strike. Writers are feuding with producers and studios over their share of the take from new media. … Religious conservatives have filed a referendum to block the implementation of a Schwarzenegger-signed law by state Senator Sheila Kuehl, one-time Dobie Gillis co-star, to eliminate school discrimination against gay and lesbian students. Fundamentalists say it will promote alternative lifestyles in the schools. Now they have to get over 400,000 valid signatures in 90 days to qualify for next June’s statewide ballot. … Rudy Giuliani told a conference of social conservatives in Washington this morning not to fear him. He would appoint conservative Supreme Court justices, he said, seeking common ground by citing his devout Catholic schoolboy past. But he didn’t back away from his pro-choice stance, and scored rival Mitt Romney for changing his positions. … A woman is at the controls of the International Space Station for the first time, with NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson taking over the helm from Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin. The Soyuz TMA-10 spacecraft will bring the previous ISS expedition — along with the first Malaysian astronaut Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor, the first Muslim to crew the ISS — back to Earth on October 21.
** FORMULA ONE RACING WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP COMING DOWN TO THE WIRE THIS WEEKEND. The Brazilian Grand Prix on Sunday. For the first time in 20 years, the Formula One world drivers championship comes down to a three-way battle in the final race of the season. In the US, the race coverage begins at 8:30 AM Pacific time on the Speed channel.
After a series of 16 races around the world, Britain’s Lewis Hamilton, the first black driver in F1, has a slight lead going into the final race. He can be the first rookie to win the world championship. Two-time defending champion Fernando Alonso of Spain, who like Hamilton races for the British McLaren team, is just four points behind. Ferrari’s Kimi Raikonnen, the flying Finn, is just three points behind Alonso. It should be a great morning of sophisticated international spectacle.
** RUGBY WORLD CUP FINAL ON SATURDAY. England takes on South Africa in Paris in the finals of the Rugby World Cup on Saturday. England is the defending world champion in rugby, a sport I once played in college. You can check in on the action here.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia is fast re-emerging as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is quite interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window. Moscow time is 11 hours ahead of Pacific time.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND U.S. ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. Crude oil prices settled at $88.60 per barrel yesterday after hitting another record during the day, just over $90. The price remains at record/near-record levels with the events in Pakistan, continued concern over the mounting Turkish crisis, Russia’s embrace of Iran, and a falling dollar. Energy markets are closed today.
Jihadist terrorists brought more instability to Pakistan yesterday
with the deadly bombing of the motorcade of former Prime Minister
Benazir Bhutto, just returned from exile.
Moscow is the largest city in Europe. Russia comprises 11 time zones, so that may be a factor as well, in addition to the loss of novelty. Putin’s New Year’s addresses — New Year is historically a bigger holiday in Russia than Christmas, which was, after all, officially suppressed during the Soviet era — reportedly have stayed in the 70% to 80% range nationwide.
There are no TV shows that compare in the US in terms of ratings, not even the Super Bowl.
Meanwhile, the mystery over Putin’s impromptu Thursday summit with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert continues. Neither side is giving any specifics as to what was discussed beyond what’s already been reported on NWN, much less what if any agreements were reached. It may well be that Mr. Olmert returned from Moscow with nothing but pleasantries. He is being criticized by the opposition in Israel for appearing weak in rushing to Moscow in the immediate wake of Putin’s trip to Iran, where the former spymaster met privately not only with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad but also Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Who, of course, is not dead …
** BUSH ENDORSES GIULIANI. Jeb Bush, that is. Jeb Bush, Jr., that is. The son of the former Florida governor, nephew of President George W. Bush, is backing former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani for the Republican presidential nomination.
“As someone who grew up around politics and candidates,” said the 2005 graduate of the University of Texas, “I know that Rudy has the leadership qualities and unmatched experience to be the next President of the United States. I’m honored to join his campaign and look forward to working with the many young professionals throughout Florida supporting the Mayor,” said Bush, who works in commercial real estate in Miami.
In itself, not the biggest deal in the world. But an interesting straw in the world, nonetheless. It comes a few weeks after the president’s longtime political confidante, Dan Bartlett, now departed from the White House, issued a blistering public critique of the Republican presidential field. All the candidates except, as it happens Rudy Giuliani, about whom Bartlett had nary a negative comment.
Incidentally, I think this means that you can forget about, if you’d heard about it in the first place, James Carville’s prediction earlier in the week on one of the cable chat shows that Jeb Bush will be the Republican presidential nominee …
** SCHWARZENEGGER ANNOUNCES COMPLETION OF KEY L.A. TRAFFIC PROJECT. In LA, this morning Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced the completion of a key project to relieve one of the most congested freeway interchanges in the US, the one where the San Diego Freeyway (I-405) meets the Ventura Freeway (US 101). $28 million from the state, part of the Big Bang Bonds infrastructure package that voters passed last November, was used to complete the project.
** PUTTING THINGS IN PERSPECTIVE: REPUBLICAN POWER BROKERS. Readers may recall that — during the strange California budget stall this past summer, which resulted in no better deal for right-wing state senators than was available a month earlier and, quite predictably, further elevated the standing of the ultra-right’s bete noire, Jerry Brown — I pooh-poohed the threat of one of the faction’s leaders, California Republican Assembly president Mike Spence, to launch a recall of the only Republican senator then supporting the budget.
I pointed out that, despite his influence in Republican party politics, he didn’t really raise money for the party.
Now he is running himself. For re-election to the West Covina School Board. Where is West Covina? It’s a little suburb to the west of Los Angeles. (Note: That’s a typo. Of course it’s east of LA.) According to his friend Jon Fleischman, a key ultra-rightist and author of the resolution to block independents from voting in the Republican presidential primary, Spence is running against candidates backed by the local teachers union. And needs help. In a race in West Covina. Which has about a tenth the population of a state Senate district.
** PAKISTAN MYSTERY. Who is behind the attack on former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, just returned to Pakistan after eight years in exile? She has a deal with President Pervez Musharaff to return to power as part of a coalition government. But somehow, just after her motorcade got to Karachi after hours of slow progress along highways packed with admirers, the streetlights went out and assassination teams were able to get perilously close to the armored car carrying Bhutto.
Nearly 150 people are known to have been killed by the two massive explosions which resulted, with more killed in a fierce ensuing firefight. And Pakistan, a haven to Al Qaeda and Taliban cadre in its remote regions, ally of the US in the Terror War, and posessor of many nuclear weapons, is further destabilized.
** CALIFORNIA INDEPENDENTS CONTINUE TO RISE.Since this point in the 1996 presidential election cycle, the proportion of independents in the California electorate has nearly doubled. It’s 19.2% now, a three point increase in the last four years alone. The two major parties continue their decline. Naturally, the California Republican Party’s executive board — under the influence of its ultra-right faction — voted to exclude independents from next February’s presidential primary. But perhaps to little avail, at least in Republican politics, as the right-wing candidates are trailing badly in polling for that primary.
** “FAMILY VALUES”: REPUBLICANS TAKE AIM AT GIULIANI, AND EACH OTHER.Social conservatives, some of them gathered in Washington where they are hearing from Republican presidential candidates, aren’t very happy with the Republican field. Even though most of the candidates pledge adherence to their agenda, there is a sneaking suspicion that they don’t really mean it. All the other candidates are taking shots at Rudy Giuliani, the frontrunner in national polls and fundraising, who runs best against the Democrats and has not changed his pro-choice and pro-gay rights views. Fred Thompson is taking shots at Giuliani and Mitt Romney, who has changed his views in advance of this race. But Thompson, who cut a wide swath through the women of Washington in his bachelor senator days, is suspect as well. For his part, Romney will make some cracks about Giuliani’s three marriages, contrasting that somewhat unsettled state of affairs with his decades long marriage.
Doesn’t that sound like a fun event?
** MARIA SHRIVER ANNOUNCES CALIFORNIA WOMEN’S CONFERENCE LINEUP. California First Lady Maria Shriver has announced the lineup for next Tuesday’s annual women’s conference in Long Beach, hosted by the former NBC anchor and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.
New York Times columnist Tom Friedman will moderate a conversation on leadership and the environment between former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Schwarzenegger.
Shriver will moderate a first-ever joint discussion with some of the spouses of the leading presidential candidates from each party: Elizabeth Edwards, Cindy McCain, Michelle Obama, Ann Romney and Jeri Thompson. What, no Bill Clinton?
ABC correspondent Deborah Roberts will moderate a conversation with women pioneers on leadership and the 2008 presidential race with first female White House Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers; first female vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro, and first female Governor of New Jersey Christine Todd Whitman.
Shriver will present the 4th annual Minerva Awards honoring the first couple’s picks as the most remarkable women of the year, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Sweet Alice Harris of Watts community organizing fame, Commander Maureen Pennington, Christy Porter, and Eunice Kennedy Shriver.
Other notable speakers include: Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan, Nobel Prize winners Dr. Muhammad Yunus and Jody Williams, First Lady of Mexico Margarita Zavala, Diane von Furstenberg, Jamie Lee Curtis, Katharine McPhee, Joan Baez, Eckhart Tolle, Nora Ephron and Linda Ellerbee.
** FORMULA ONE RACING WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP COMING DOWN TO THE WIRE THIS WEEKEND.The Brazilian Grand Prix on Sunday. For the first time in 20 years, the Formula One world drivers championship comes down to a three-way battle in the final race of the season. In the US, the race coverage begins at 8:30 AM Pacific time on the Speed channel.
After a series of races around the world, Britain’s Lewis Hamilton, the first black driver in F1, has a slight lead going into the final race. He can be the first rookie to win the world championship. Two-time defending champion Fernando Alonso of Spain, who like Hamilton races for the British McLaren team, is just four points behind. Ferrari’s Kimi Raikonnen, the flying Finn, is just three points behind Alonso. It should be a great morning of sophisticated international spectacle.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia is fast re-emerging as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is quite interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window. Moscow time is 11 hours ahead of Pacific time.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND U.S. ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. Crude oil prices are over $90 per barrel with the events in Pakistan, continued concern over the mounting Turkish crisis, Russia’s embrace of Iran, and a falling dollar.
Former Governor-turned-Attorney General Jerry Brown, who
helped with the tail end of the legal fight to bring the world’s
largest stem cell research program into being, discusses the
contentious politics and bright promise of the new bioscience
in this NWN video.
One way of looking at California’s current impasses on health care reform and water policy is to consider stem cell research. After nearly three years of legal stalls, the state’s program is at last fully underway, the largest in the world.
As a result of the persistence of its advocates, including Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, California is swiftly becoming the world center of a new bioscience. Stem cell research holds the promise of revolutionizing medical care, through the ability to manipulate the cells into regenerative tools.
50 stem cell researchers have been recruited recently to work in California labs. They’re part of a new gold rush. That gold rush was triggered by the November 2004 passage of Proposition 71, a $3 billion state bond issue to finance stem cell research. That’s far more than any other place in the world.
The state program was needed to get around President George W. Bush’s 2001 restrictions on federal funding of research. Bush, heavily influenced by religious fundamentalists in the Republican base, made moves that severely limited the embryonic stem cell lines that could be used. As he did, he flew in the face of urgings by people on both sides of the political aisle, including former First Lady Nancy Reagan.
Given opposition from right-wing Republicans in the state’s Legislature, an initiative was qualified for California’s November 2004 ballot. While it led in the polls, its passage was in doubt until Schwarzenegger intervened. With his backing, the ballot measure swept to victory with 59% of the vote, and the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine was created.
But the agency set up to disperse the funds raised through bond sales was sued by conservative interests. This blocked the sale of bonds authorized by the state’s voters. While then state Attorney General Bill Lockyer fought the well-funded opponents in court, the program languished until last year.
Then Schwarzenegger intervened again. The former action movie superstar authorized a big loan to the stem cell research agency, now headquartered in San Francisco, from the state’s general fund. And Silicon Valley philanthropic interests, largely centered around the Intel microprocessor fortune, also kicked in funding. This jump started the program and the research money began to flow.
The loan money that came a year ago allowed the beginning of research projects, the training of researchers, and the development of facilities, all necessary to get around the restrictions of the federal government.
The state’s legal fight to create the voter-approved program continued under former Governor-turned-Attorney General Jerry Brown, who made stem cell research a central part of his landslide election campaign last November.
The lawsuit against Prop 71 was finally defeated and Lockyer, now California’s treasurer, made ready for the first round of bond sales to really get the program off the ground.
That took place last month, and it was a smashing success. $250 million worth of bonds were sold in less than two days.
Strikingly, over 40% of those bonds were bought by individuals, in a special program set up by Lockyer. It was a financial vote for the future, a sign of faith.
Something that people bemoaning the current inability to get anything done on health care and water policy might want to keep in mind.
Following yesterday’s vote, Turkish troops are poised to move
into northern Iraq en masse. Meanwhile, House Speaker Nancy
Pelosi is finally easing away from a tinderbox resolution condemning
Turkey for actions taken by the late Ottoman Empire.
It all came after a three hour-plus session very early this morning in the Pacific time zone, mid-day in Moscow, in which Putin took questions for over three hours from around his country in a live TV broadcast. Many questions were posed from groups of Russian citizens in live satellite link-ups — mostly quite picturesque — from seemingly every corner of the country. Other questions came in via the Internet, text message, and phone calls. Nothing like this has been done in America. Putin, in a sharp gray suit, with male and female anchors flanking him, fielded the questions in a modernist ivory studio in Moscow, the red, white, and blue tricolors of the Russian flag interpolated into the design, looking more fashionable than patriotic.
I watched Putin’s performance in its entirety, along with follow-on coverage and analysis on a live TV link from Moscow, from 1 AM to 6 AM Pacific time today. So I’m a bit tired. If I’m ignoring some of the usual repetitive California spin today, which I am, that’s why.
Putin, who can come across as a forbidding personality in still photographs, proved himself to be very adept in handling the questions. He’s actually quite talkative. He dealt with everything without notes, rattling off facts and figures and weaving in personal anecdotes and overall themes in a manner which would make an American political consultant proud of his charge.
The Russian government says he received over 2.2 million questions through the various means. This is an annual program he’s done since 2001. It’s clearly quite popular, as is he.
People seemed very excited about Russia’s win yesterday in a key international football (soccer) match with England, their first since the Soviet days. The Brits, who beat Russia last month in London, played this time in Moscow without present and former team captains John Terry and David Beckham, both of whom are injured. (Yes, folks, my “rodina” is England, not Russia.)
Putin was adept in referring to the game, which the Russian media views as historic, on several occasions, and used it to strike a telling theme. The Russian national squad beat England, he said, because of its “team spirit” and “good coaching.” Later in the show, he said that the new president — he’s term limited, but will lead the ruling United Russia party’s list in the December parliamentary election, and is expected to become the new prime minister — must continue the successful policies that he has pursued. No major figure has put himself forth yet as a presidential candidate.
Putin talked a fair amount about sports — Russians are excited about winning the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi — and a great deal about foreign affairs. He also acknowledged some ongoing problems in the country, with the delivery of public services, with traffic, and with inflation, currently running higher than the high rate of economic growth.
Intriguingly, a retired mechanic asked Putin about a statement from former US Secretary of State Madeline Albright that Russia was hoarding its resources. This question, which played to my suspicious ear like a possible set-up, prompted a soliloquy from Putin that began with the US role in oil-rich Iraq.
“Such ideas are nurtured by certain politicians in the West. As I see it, such a political erotic, as I would call it, would bring some people pleasure, but would hardly result in positive outcome. And the best example of this are events in Iraq.
“The Americans have learned to shoot straight,” said the former intelligence chief. “But they haven’t established order. You can overthrow a tyrannical regime, like that of Saddam Hussein’s. But fighting the people is a hopeless case. Thank God Russia is not Iraq. Russia has enough arms and people to protect itself and its interests. Both on its own soil and in other regions of the world,” he said, rather pointedly.
At another point in the telecast, the launch of a new Russian missile was shown. Putin revealed that Russia is developing a new nuclear weapon, and a new nuclear submarine.
His saber-rattling was rather subtle, and did not come off as menacing in the old Soviet stereotype. He was matter of fact about what he was saying, as though it was all perfectly logical. Which from his standpoint, I suspect it is.
Putin presented himself as a sophisticated, youthful father figure — accessible, patient, authoritative — the continuing essential man in Russia’s ongoing re-emergence as one of the world’s great powers. It was a strong performance. Though he has assumed what in America would feel like dictatorial powers, he hasn’t succumbed to the Castroite caudillo mentality. This is a politician who could compete very successfully in modern electoral politics.
** QUICK HITS. More instability in Pakistan, with formerly exiled Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto’s triumphal homecoming parade marred by two massive explosions, leaving over 100 people dead. … California Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez’s high-flying international travel and luxury spending from his campaign account will be investigated by the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission. (I’ve seen this before; his enemies on the left and right shouldn’t get their hopes up.) … Former Governor-turned-Attorney General Jerry Brown issued a legal opinion giving a green light for San Francisco officials to sue to remove city Supervisor Ed Jew from office for violating residency requirements. … Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger spent the day in private conversations. Very mixed signals coming from the labor camp which so dramatically attacked him in two newspapers yesterday on his health care proposals.
** QUICK HITS. California Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez this morning sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi urging passage of the resolution condemning Turkey for “genocide” on account of actions by the late Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago. An odd move, considering that the resolution has destabilized US-Turkey relations, is opposed by former President Bill Clinton (Nunez is a national co-chair of Hillary Clinton’s campaign), and is losing altitude politically as more pols think through its geostrategic implications. … Congressional Democrats, as expected, failed to overturn President Bush’s veto of the expansion of the popular SCHIP (State Children’s Health Insurance Program). Bush said yesterday he wants a scaled down version. … Kansas Senator Sam Brownback, who’s made little impact on the race, is set to drop out of the Republican presidential campaign. … Paris blues as French President Nicolas Sarkozy, a darling of the American right when elected earlier this year, and wife Cecilia, a former model, are splitsville as of today. Which coincides with a huge transit strike. … China, very angry about American awards for the Dalai Lama yesterday in Washington, says it will join the space race later in the decade with an unmanned orbital mission around the moon. … Rather small turnouts, according to sources in both parties, for the events around the state that constitute some of organized labor’s sudden “war” against Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger over his somewhat Rube Goldberg-like health care proposal. I’ll have more on the confused state of the health care debate as the issue drags on.
Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., and Peter Lawford had all preceded Bishop before he passed away last night at his home in Newport Beach, California. He was 89. His longtime friend, legendary Hollywood publicist Warren Cowan, said he died of “multiple causes.”
Bishop was the master of ceremonies at President John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Gala in 1961. Along with the rest of the Rat Pack, he starred in the original Ocean’s Eleven, and was part of the famous “Summits” at the Sands Hotel. But the Sands gave way to the wrecking ball, and is now a convention center. And Joey Bishop, like the Rat Pack, and the Sands, is no more. Only a few pieces of the Old Vegas — like Binion’s in downtown Vegas, which I rather like for a certain retro charm — now remain.
Vegas is huge and corporate now. Very glitzy, but not necessarily very cool, though George Clooney and Company have done their level best in the Ocean’s Eleven remakes.
Turkey’s done it before, in the 1990s, but the problem is, in their view, more severe now, with the militant PKK organization pulling off big raids inside Turkey.
Iraqi and US officials don’t want it to happen, of course, and Iraqi leaders vow to defend their territory. In reality, the Iraqi military doesn’t seem strong enough to repel the Turkish army.
Turkey’s counter is this: Treat the PKK like Al Qaeda and we’ll refrain from moving into northern Iraq.
Meanwhile, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is finally easing away from her championing of that congressional resolution condeming Turkey for “genocide” during the brutal suppression of Armenians by the late Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago. Which has infuriated the Turkish government and populace, as you might suppose, and at an especially sensitive moment. Turkey, a key NATO ally, is one of the few Muslim countries with which the US has continued to maintain good relations.
California Democratic members of Congress have spearheaded this piece of rocket science. Along with Pelosi, LA Congressmen Brad Sherman and Adam Schiff, with House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Tom Lantos of the San Francisco Bay Area, have been key ringleaders of the effort. Lantos, incidentally, had voted against the move, which former President Bill Clinton strongly opposed during his presidency, in the past.
After greeting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert at the Kremlin, Putin said, “We know how concerned you are about the situation surrounding the Iranian (nuclear program). I am ready to share the results of my visit.”
In response, Olmert said he would “be glad to hear from you about the results of your trip to Iran and talk about other concerns.”
Putin said he expected to discuss with Olmert “the whole range of bilateral relations,” adding “We have much to discuss.”
Olmert thanked the Russian leader for an opportunity to meet “despite a very busy week” the Russian president has had. He said these talks “are aimed at the strengthening of relations between Russia, a world power, and the state of Israel.”
The press was then kicked out of the room.
** PUTIN’S MARATHON LIVE TV QUESTION TIME. A fascinating three hour-plus performance by Russian President Vladimir Putin, taking questions from around Russia in a massive virtual town hall, from 1 AM to 4:15 AM Pacific time. Then a lot of discussion and analysis. So I’m dragging a bit here today. I’ll have more to say about it later.
Rudy Giuliani hits Hillary Clinton for “ambiguity and shifting
of position” on Iran.
** GIULIANI AND CLINTON GOING AT IT. Republican presidential frontrunner is continuing this week his new strategy of campaigning by attacking Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton. It’s a good idea for two reasons.
First, Clinton has pulled ahead of him, leaving some daylight between them, in some recent polls. Second, it appeals to the Republican base because of their ongoing disdain for Clinton. Giuliani’s sometimes brusque New York manner thus becomes a plus, showing he is someone who can take it to Hillary.
Of course, each still has to win his and her respective party nominations.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia is fast re-emerging as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is quite interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window. Moscow time is 11 hours ahead of Pacific time.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND U.S. ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. Crude oil prices are in the $88 to $89 per barrel range with continued concern over the mounting Turkish crisis and Russia’s embrace of Iran.
Following yesterday’s vote, Turkish troops are poised to move
into northern Iraq en masse. Meanwhile, House Speaker Nancy
Pelosi is finally easing away from a tinderbox resolution condemning
Turkey for actions taken by the late Ottoman Empire.
It all came after a three hour-plus session very early this morning in the Pacific time zone, mid-day in Moscow, in which Putin took questions for over three hours from around his country in a live TV broadcast. Many questions were posed from groups of Russian citizens in live satellite link-ups — mostly quite picturesque — from seemingly every corner of the country. Other questions came in via the Internet, text message, and phone calls. Nothing like this has been done in America. Putin, in a sharp gray suit, with male and female anchors flanking him, fielded the questions in a modernist ivory studio in Moscow, the red, white, and blue tricolors of the Russian flag interpolated into the design, looking more fashionable than patriotic.
I watched Putin’s performance in its entirety, along with follow-on coverage and analysis on a live TV link from Moscow, from 1 AM to 6 AM Pacific time today. So I’m a bit tired. If I’m ignoring some of the usual repetitive California spin today, which I am, that’s why.
Putin, who can come across as a forbidding personality in still photographs, proved himself to be very adept in handling the questions. He’s actually quite talkative. He dealt with everything without notes, rattling off facts and figures and weaving in personal anecdotes and overall themes in a manner which would make an American political consultant proud of his charge.
The Russian government says he received over 2.2 million questions through the various means. This is an annual program he’s done since 2001. It’s clearly quite popular, as is he.
People seemed very excited about Russia’s win yesterday in a key international football (soccer) match with England, their first since the Soviet days. The Brits, who beat Russia last month in London, played this time in Moscow without present and former team captains John Terry and David Beckham, both of whom are injured. (Yes, folks, my “rodina” is England, not Russia.)
Putin was adept in referring to the game, which the Russian media views as historic, on several occasions, and used it to strike a telling theme. The Russian national squad beat England, he said, because of its “team spirit” and “good coaching.” Later in the show, he said that the new president — he’s term limited, but will lead the ruling United Russia party’s list in the December parliamentary election, and is expected to become the new prime minister — must continue the successful policies that he has pursued. No major figure has put himself forth yet as a presidential candidate.
Putin talked a fair amount about sports — Russians are excited about winning the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi — and a great deal about foreign affairs. He also acknowledged some ongoing problems in the country, with the delivery of public services, with traffic, and with inflation, currently running higher than the high rate of economic growth.
Intriguingly, a retired mechanic asked Putin about a statement from former US Secretary of State Madeline Albright that Russia was hoarding its resources. This question, which played to my suspicious ear like a possible set-up, prompted a soliloquy from Putin that began with the US role in oil-rich Iraq.
“Such ideas are nurtured by certain politicians in the West. As I see it, such a political erotic, as I would call it, would bring some people pleasure, but would hardly result in positive outcome. And the best example of this are events in Iraq.
“The Americans have learned to shoot straight,” said the former intelligence chief. “But they haven’t established order. You can overthrow a tyrannical regime, like that of Saddam Hussein’s. But fighting the people is a hopeless case. Thank God Russia is not Iraq. Russia has enough arms and people to protect itself and its interests. Both on its own soil and in other regions of the world,” he said, rather pointedly.
At another point in the telecast, the launch of a new Russian missile was shown. Putin revealed that Russia is developing a new nuclear weapon, and a new nuclear submarine.
His saber-rattling was rather subtle, and did not come off as menacing in the old Soviet stereotype. He was matter of fact about what he was saying, as though it was all perfectly logical. Which from his standpoint, I suspect it is.
Putin presented himself as a sophisticated, youthful father figure — accessible, patient, authoritative — the continuing essential man in Russia’s ongoing re-emergence as one of the world’s great powers. It was a strong performance. Though he has assumed what in America would feel like dictatorial powers, he hasn’t succumbed to the Castroite caudillo mentality. This is a politician who could compete very successfully in modern electoral politics.
** QUICK HITS. More instability in Pakistan, with formerly exiled Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto’s triumphal homecoming parade marred by two massive explosions, leaving over 100 people dead. … California Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez’s high-flying international travel and luxury spending from his campaign account will be investigated by the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission. (I’ve seen this before; his enemies on the left and right shouldn’t get their hopes up.) … Former Governor-turned-Attorney General Jerry Brown issued a legal opinion giving a green light for San Francisco officials to sue to remove city Supervisor Ed Jew from office for violating residency requirements. … Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger spent the day in private conversations. Very mixed signals coming from the labor camp which so dramatically attacked him in two newspapers yesterday on his health care proposals.
** QUICK HITS. California Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez this morning sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi urging passage of the resolution condemning Turkey for “genocide” on account of actions by the late Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago. An odd move, considering that the resolution has destabilized US-Turkey relations, is opposed by former President Bill Clinton (Nunez is a national co-chair of Hillary Clinton’s campaign), and is losing altitude politically as more pols think through its geostrategic implications. … Congressional Democrats, as expected, failed to overturn President Bush’s veto of the expansion of the popular SCHIP (State Children’s Health Insurance Program). Bush said yesterday he wants a scaled down version. … Kansas Senator Sam Brownback, who’s made little impact on the race, is set to drop out of the Republican presidential campaign. … Paris blues as French President Nicolas Sarkozy, a darling of the American right when elected earlier this year, and wife Cecilia, a former model, are splitsville as of today. Which coincides with a huge transit strike. … China, very angry about American awards for the Dalai Lama yesterday in Washington, says it will join the space race later in the decade with an unmanned orbital mission around the moon. … Rather small turnouts, according to sources in both parties, for the events around the state that constitute some of organized labor’s sudden “war” against Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger over his somewhat Rube Goldberg-like health care proposal. I’ll have more on the confused state of the health care debate as the issue drags on.
Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., and Peter Lawford had all preceded Bishop before he passed away last night at his home in Newport Beach, California. He was 89. His longtime friend, legendary Hollywood publicist Warren Cowan, said he died of “multiple causes.”
Bishop was the master of ceremonies at President John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Gala in 1961. Along with the rest of the Rat Pack, he starred in the original Ocean’s Eleven, and was part of the famous “Summits” at the Sands Hotel. But the Sands gave way to the wrecking ball, and is now a convention center. And Joey Bishop, like the Rat Pack, and the Sands, is no more. Only a few pieces of the Old Vegas — like Binion’s in downtown Vegas, which I rather like for a certain retro charm — now remain.
Vegas is huge and corporate now. Very glitzy, but not necessarily very cool, though George Clooney and Company have done their level best in the Ocean’s Eleven remakes.
Turkey’s done it before, in the 1990s, but the problem is, in their view, more severe now, with the militant PKK organization pulling off big raids inside Turkey.
Iraqi and US officials don’t want it to happen, of course, and Iraqi leaders vow to defend their territory. In reality, the Iraqi military doesn’t seem strong enough to repel the Turkish army.
Turkey’s counter is this: Treat the PKK like Al Qaeda and we’ll refrain from moving into northern Iraq.
Meanwhile, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is finally easing away from her championing of that congressional resolution condeming Turkey for “genocide” during the brutal suppression of Armenians by the late Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago. Which has infuriated the Turkish government and populace, as you might suppose, and at an especially sensitive moment. Turkey, a key NATO ally, is one of the few Muslim countries with which the US has continued to maintain good relations.
California Democratic members of Congress have spearheaded this piece of rocket science. Along with Pelosi, LA Congressmen Brad Sherman and Adam Schiff, with House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Tom Lantos of the San Francisco Bay Area, have been key ringleaders of the effort. Lantos, incidentally, had voted against the move, which former President Bill Clinton strongly opposed during his presidency, in the past.
After greeting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert at the Kremlin, Putin said, “We know how concerned you are about the situation surrounding the Iranian (nuclear program). I am ready to share the results of my visit.”
In response, Olmert said he would “be glad to hear from you about the results of your trip to Iran and talk about other concerns.”
Putin said he expected to discuss with Olmert “the whole range of bilateral relations,” adding “We have much to discuss.”
Olmert thanked the Russian leader for an opportunity to meet “despite a very busy week” the Russian president has had. He said these talks “are aimed at the strengthening of relations between Russia, a world power, and the state of Israel.”
The press was then kicked out of the room.
** PUTIN’S MARATHON LIVE TV QUESTION TIME. A fascinating three hour-plus performance by Russian President Vladimir Putin, taking questions from around Russia in a massive virtual town hall, from 1 AM to 4:15 AM Pacific time. Then a lot of discussion and analysis. So I’m dragging a bit here today. I’ll have more to say about it later.
Rudy Giuliani hits Hillary Clinton for “ambiguity and shifting
of position” on Iran.
** GIULIANI AND CLINTON GOING AT IT. Republican presidential frontrunner is continuing this week his new strategy of campaigning by attacking Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton. It’s a good idea for two reasons.
First, Clinton has pulled ahead of him, leaving some daylight between them, in some recent polls. Second, it appeals to the Republican base because of their ongoing disdain for Clinton. Giuliani’s sometimes brusque New York manner thus becomes a plus, showing he is someone who can take it to Hillary.
Of course, each still has to win his and her respective party nominations.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia is fast re-emerging as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is quite interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window. Moscow time is 11 hours ahead of Pacific time.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND U.S. ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. Crude oil prices are in the $88 to $89 per barrel range with continued concern over the mounting Turkish crisis and Russia’s embrace of Iran.
Russian President Vladimir Putin opened MAKS 2007, the
biennial Moscow Air Show, in August. Putin’s seeming embrace
of Iran has thrown US strategy into further disarray.
No members of the Israeli press are accompanying Olmert on his trip to Moscow, which was reportedly planned on Tuesday. This will be the only single-day visit by an Israeli prime minister to a foreign capital outside the Middle East in decades.
Meanwhile, Olmert spent three hours Wednesday night with Secretary of State Condi Rice going over preparations for November’s Israeli-Palestinian peace conference set for Annapolis, Maryland, home of the U.S. Naval Academy.
What have US presidential candidates had to say about these matters, which mark a major shift in global politics highly impactful on the presidency? Not much. John McCain said again that Russia should be expelled form the G-8 (the Group of Eight major industrialized, Westernized nations). But he said that before Putin’s trip to Iran. It was, of course, a huge topic in President Bush’s press conference this morning, though the journalists didn’t quite seem to know what to ask.
** FRED COMES TO CALIFORNIA. Former Senator and Law & Order star Fred Thompson, now ambling his way towards the Republican presidential nomination, comes to California for three days of campaigning and fundraising at the end of the month. I believe it’s his first trip back to the Golden State, a very key early primary on February 5th, since he declared his official candidacy last month in LA during an episode of The Tonight Show. Thompson has slid to fourth in the latest California poll.
** WATCH VLADIMIR PUTIN LIVE TONIGHT IN WEBCAST FROM MOSCOW. With Russian President Vladimir Putin riding high on the global stage, as anticipated on NWN at the beginning of the month, he is doing his annual Question Time with the Russian people. It’s set for noon tomorrow in Moscow, same day he meets Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert following on the heels of the former spymaster’s visit yesterday to Iran. Which means the event, with English translation, will be at 1 AM Pacific time tonight.
1.3 million Russian citizens have reportedly submitted questions, via e-mail, text message, and phone. Arnold, eat your heart out!
** RUDY’S BIG STATE STRATEGY. Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani is looking good right now in the Republican primaries in the four biggest states in the country. He has leads in various polls in California, Florida, and New York, all of which will take place before the end of the first week in February. And today he picked up the endorsement of a rising conservative pol, Texas Governor Rick Perry, who wowed the right-wingers at last month’s California Republican Party convention in Palm Springs after they had to sit through their own Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s lecture on their political relevancy, or lack of same. One slight problem. Texas hasn’t moved its primary up, after an early effort to do so. It’s still in early March. So if the race has become trench warfare after a series of inconclusive battles, Perry’s endorsement in Texas could be key. In any event, he helps with Giuliani’s problem with his party’s far right.
** OIL HITS NEW RECORD PRICE ON CONTINUED GLOBAL INSECURITY: TURKISH VOTE, TALK ABOUT IRAN. Crude oil prices hit another record high today of $89 per barrel amidst heightened geopolitical insecurity. Turkey’s parliament voted by a more than 500-vote margin to authorize a major military incursion into oil-rich northern Iraq to strike at Kurdish guerillas using it as a safe haven. And President George W. Bush ratcheted up the rhetoric around Iran, just a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin, in Tehran, made it clear that Russia opposes any military strike against Iran.
“We’ve got a leader in Iran who has announced that he wants to destroy Israel,” said Bush at a hastily arranged morning press conference. “So I’ve told people that, if you’re interested in avoiding World War III, it seems like you ought to be interested in preventing them from having the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon.”
Actually, contrary to what Bush said, Iran already has the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon. What is at question is whether Iran will get the technology necessary to make a nuclear weapon.
Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will venture to Moscow tomorrow to meet with Putin in a hastily scheduled conference. This is the first time in decades that an Israeli head of government has gone to any foreign capital outside the Middle East for a one-day visit.
Incidentally, fossil fuel-rich Russia, rolling in fresh revenue from its oil and gas businesses, benefits greatly from a run-up in the oil price. As does Iran. (At one point, there was a seeming US strategy to destabilize Iran with a lower oil price, which OPEC ultimately did not play along with.) As do US oil companies.
Putin says there should be no military strike against Iran. Russia appears poised to supply Iran with some advanced military hardware, reportedly including MiG-29 jet fighter enginees for Iranian aircraft. Other hardware may be in the pipeline.
Israel and Russia have relatively good ties. Putin’s moves are not so much about any long-term alliance with Iran as they are about promoting Russia’s geostrategic agenda. America’s quagmire in Iraq and problems with Iran have presented Russia with a huge opportunity and the KGB veterans running the country are playing that.
Anticipating some major moves by Moscow, I added a live link on NWN to the new, 24/7 Russia Today news channel at the beginning of October.
Russia is very perturbed by the U.S. move to place an
anti-missile shield in Eastern Europe.
** TURKISH CRISIS CONTINUES, CONGRESSIONAL RESOLUTION MAY FAIL. At least eight members of Congress have dropped off the resolution condemning Turkey for actions taken nearly a century ago by the late Ottoman Empire. This drops the number of co-sponsors below the narrow majority the resolution once held. But the outcome is still in some doubt. Former President Bill Clinton opposes the resolution, as he did during his presidency.
Meanwhile, the Turkish parliament is about to authorize a major military incursion into northern Iraq to deal with Kurdish guerilla enclaves there.
One wonders about media hype over his candidacy, which he’s signaled all year won’t happen, and has been highly unlikely for all the reasons repeatedly discussed here regardless of his own view.
** LABOR AND SCHWARZENEGGER ON HEALTH CARE. There’s a fair amount of talk about a move by some of organized labor to criticize Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s health care proposal. The state AFL-CIO hired Democratic PR consultant Chris Lehane, a former Clinton aide during the Monica mess of the late ’90s, to help spearhead the anti-Arnold charge. To the extent there is an anti-Arnold charge.
Anyone who watched yesterday’s webcast with Schwarzenegger, Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, and LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa — centered on traffic congestion in LA — came away with the impression they were watching a buddy picture, as the posts in the NWN Forum section yesterday made clear. And Nunez, a former top labor operative, is the Democratic negotiator with Schwarzenegger on health care. The former action superstar vetoed the Democratic health care plan just the other day. Nunez was its co-author. If there is a war on … well, there isn’t a war on.
As I’ve reported before, SEIU is pushing Nunez and other Democratic legislators for a hard line to get more money from business for health care than Schwarzenegger has wanted. And that there should be more subsidization of health care than Schwarzenegger currently has. Their theory is that Schwarzenegger will sign pretty much anything in the end because he wants a victory.
Schwarzenegger seems to view this all as part of the dance of negotiation. The problem for him, and for labor, and legislative Democrats, is the issue has dragged on so long it’s begun to be a bore.
Then there’s the issue of how similar Schwarzenegger’s plan is to that of … Hillary Clinton. Nunez and Villaraigosa are national co-chairs of the Clinton campaign. Lehane just did some work on Clinton’s behalf helping unmask the Republican scheme to change the allocation of California’s electoral college votes.
Lehane, incidentally, who is a prime source for a couple of big conventional newspapers and celebrated as a result, worked for then Governor Gray Davis during the electric power crisis. He also worked for Southern California Edison, the utility seeking a state bailout. And worked out of the Governor’s Office in the process. Until I asked him about the obvious conflict of interest.
He explained to me that there was no conflict of interest. “The governor and Edison have the same energy policy.” After Gray Davis read that, he fired Lehane.
Nationally, SEIU is neutral on the presidential race, noting the strength of Clinton. But California SEIU is more to the left, backing John Edwards.
There is both more — and perhaps ultimately less — to this than meets the eye.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia is fast re-emerging as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is quite interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window. Moscow time is 11 hours ahead of Pacific time.
Turkish raids on Kurdish enclaves have stepped up in advance of
an expected military incursion into northern Iraq. Crude oil prices
hit a new record on account of the crisis.
** NEW U.S. MARITIME STRATEGY PRESENTED IN LIVE WEBCAST TOMORROW MORNING. Admiral Gary Roughead, Chief of Naval Operations, General James T. Conway, Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps, and Admiral Thad W. Allen, Commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard, will present the new Maritime Strategy known as “A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower” at the International Seapower Symposium at the Naval War College on October 17. The live webcast begins at 5:45 AM Pacific time on navy.mil.
** SCHWARZENEGGER PRISON BONDS PLAN WINS IN COURT. A legal challenge against the plan by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders to finance expansion and renovation of the reeling California prison system with $8 billion in bonds has survived a legal challenge. Says Schwarzenegger finance spokesman H.D. Palmer: “Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Loren McMaster has reversed an earlier tentative ruling and has, in legal parlance, ‘granted the state’s demurrer to the complaint without leave to amend.’ In non-legal speak, that means that the state won and the court will dismiss the lawsuit.
“While the plaintiffs have an opportunity to appeal or ask for reconsideration within 60 days of the filing of the final decision document, this ruling tracks with state Supreme Court precedent on the issue, in our view.”
The surge is due to the Turkish crisis and continued weakness in the dollar, which also led to a new record price for gold yesterday. It will be interesting to see how the market factors in Russia’s new moves in the Middle East. Russia prospers on global insecurity, as one of the leading oil and natural gas producers.
I think it’s safe to say that Putin’s chat the other day in Moscow with US Secretary of State Condi Rice and Defense Secretary Bob Gates — he let them cool their heels for 45 minutes before showing up to discuss his objections to NATO encroachment on Russia’s “near abroad” and the proposed US missile shield in Eastern Europe — did not go well.
On the Democratic side, the Clintons’ campaign bested the crack Obama California fundraising operation in the past quarter, $4.8 million to $3.7 million. John Edwards trailed far behind with $1 million raised in California. Bill Richardson raised about $550,000.
On the Republican side, Mitt Romney reversed the national picture by edging out Rudy Giuliani, $1.3 million to $1.1 million. (Giuliani leads in California primary polls by a wide margin.) John McCain came third, with $570,000. Libertarian Texas Congressman Ron Paul edged out former Law & Order star Fred Thompson, with roughly $500,00 to the former senator’s $460,000. Thompson formally declared his candidacy here last month on The Tonight Show.
The top two Democrats, Clinton and Obama, outraised the top two Republicans, Romney and Giuliani, in California by 3.5 to 1.
They do it to raise money, and to raise stature. (Not that Clinton needs the latter.) The amount of money isn’t tremendous, but it is growing. About a half-million dollars so far, with 60% of it going to Democrats. Obama is the clear leader, with about $200,000, over three times as much as the Clintons.
Iraq has the third largest reserves of oil in the world and northern Iraq, where the Kurdish population predominates, is oil rich.
** PUTIN IN IRAN. If Russian President Vladimir Putin is promoting a pro-US agenda in Tehran, it’s certainly not evident in his comments. I watched Putin’s press conference there live. Through translation, he said that shipping on the Caspian Sea — the event is a summit of Caspian Sea states — should be conducted only under the flags of Caspian states (Russia, Iran, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan). He was discouraging of outside states pursuing oil and gas pipeline projects in the region. All the states agreed that they should cooperate more economically, and Putin and the others agreed with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s suggestion to set up a joint economic organization.
Next year’s summit of the Caspian states, said Putin, will be held in Russia. Russian trade with Iran will be increased. All the Caspian states agreed to the principle of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. But all the states have the right to develop peaceful nuclear power programs.
As a first step, an economic conference of the Caspian states will be held next year in Russia. Trade with Iran is going to be increased, and the Caspian states re-affirmed their adherence to the non-proliferation of the nuclear weapons as an absolute condition, mentioning that all Caspian states have the right to develop peaceful nuclear programmes though the issue will be discussed further on Tuesday. He also said that he would talk more with the Iranian leadership about their nuclear program, currently moving slowly due to Russian foot-dragging on nuclear fuels.
Meanwhile, one report in the Russian press predicted that Russia will sell MiG-29 jet fighter engines to Iran for use in their domestically-designed fighter aircraft.
On the Republican side, Rudy Giuliani has $11.2 million cash on hand to Mitt Romney’s $9.2 million, Fred Thompson’s $7.1 million, and John McCain’s $3.5 million. The libertarian Texas Congressman Ron Paul, an asterisk in the polls, has $5.4 million.
On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton has $35 million to Barack Obama’s $32 million, John Edwards’ $10 million, and Bill Richardson’s $5 million.
** SCHWARZENEGGER LIVE WEBCAST THIS MORNING. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announces the award of $150 million to Los Angeles for traffic synchronization in a live webcast event at 9:30 AM. Joining him will be LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez. The money is part of the Big Bang Bonds infrastructure package passed last November.
The cause? The housing slump and higher gasoline prices.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia is fast re-emerging as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is quite interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window. Moscow time is 11 hours ahead of Pacific time.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, seen here at last week’s summit with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, is in Iran later today and tomorrow for a key summit. Over the past few days he summited with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and met with U.S. Secretary of State Condi Rice and Defense Secretary Bob Gates.
** PUTIN STILL GOING TO IRAN. After a day of rumors that the trip was off, Russian President Vladimir Putin will reportedly arrive shortly in Iran.
According to the Russia Today news channel, owned and operated by the state news agency: Vladimir Putin is heading for Iran despite reports of an assassination plot against him. It will be the first visit by a Russian leader there for over 60 years. Along with four other presidents (those of Iran, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan) Mr Putin will attend a summit to discuss the legal status of the Caspian Sea, which has caused tension since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Some rumors had it that Putin might have struck a deal with the US to further isolate Iran, thus accounting for his absence. But evidently not.
The state councils, representing SEIU members in California, Washington, Michigan, Idaho, Montana, Minnesota, Ohio, West Virginia and Oregon, compromise about half of the SEIU membership. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama managed to block the national SEIU endorsement of Edwards, which had been long anticipated, last week. Obama picked up the Illinois and Indiana state council endorsements today.
** NEW RECORD OIL PRICE. Crude oil prices surged today past the $85 barrier to a new record close of $86.19 per barrel. This happened on news of unsettling geopolitical developments and continued weakness in the dollar.
** GEOSTRATEGIC PROBLEMS BEARING DOWN ON THE PRESIDENCY. As we continue in our usual focus on such matters as tweaking term limits and the domestic political tug-of-war over Iraq, a couple of large and growing geostrategic problems are bearing down on presidential politics.
The historic NATO alliance with Turkey is beginning to unravel, due to Kurdish guerilla strikes into Turkey from safe havens in northern Iraq and the insistence of Congressional Democrats on labeling Turkey a “genocidal” state for actions against Armenians by the late Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago. Turkey has been an absolutely key ally in the US efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, through allowing the use of the massive Incirlik air base, an essential air bridge for the maintaining of US force projection in the theater.
And the talks in Moscow over the past few days between Secretary of State Condi Rice, Secretary of Defense Bob Gates, their Russian counterparts, and President Vladimir Putin have failed. The two sides could not come to an agreement on the US dropping its proposed missile shield project in Eastern Europe and backing off continued NATO expansion in Russia’s “near abroad” in exchange for Russia backing the US play in the Middle East.
So Putin, in the midst of a sensational story in the Russian media about a purported assassination suicide plot against him in Tehran, is about to arrive in the Iranian capital. He will be the first Russian or Soviet leader to visit Iran since Joseph Stalin in 1943.
While the occasion is a summit of states on the Caspian Sea, his purpose in going is probably to feel out the Iranian leadership and determine how best to keep the US pinned down as it is in the Middle East without too greatly empowering Iran.
In case you haven’t guessed, the US problems in Iraq are a major factor allowing Russia to so quickly re-emerge as a major world power.
** LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL POLL OF NEVADA: CLINTON AND GIULIANI LEAD.In a new poll of second-in-the-nation Nevada by Mason-Dixon Research for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Hillary Clinton leads the Democratic presidential race and Rudy Giuliani leads the Republican race.
On the Democratic side, it’s Clinton 39%, Barack Obama 21%, John Edwards 9%, and Bill Richardson 8%. Obama has just expanded his Nevada operation to some 50 staffers, while Edwards previously redeployed much of his staff to Iowa and other states.
On the Republican side, it’s Giuliani 28%, Fred Thompson 23%, Mitt Romney 17%, and John McCain 9%.
The Democratic presidential candidates debate in Las Vegas next month.
The term limits change initiative on next February’s presidential primary ballot experienced a five-point slip in support since June. Then the measure was favored by 56% to 28%. Now it’s favored by 51% to 27%.
Proposals to legalize illegal immigrants already in California and to raise the sales tax to finance universal health care enjoy slim majorities among California voters. By 53% to 36%, a proposal to extend legal residency to illegal immigrants already in California is favored. A proposal to raise the sales tax by one cent per dollar to extend health insurance to all Californians is also favored, 52% to 38%.
** IOWA SEIU BACKS EDWARDS. John Edwards’ campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination received a blow last week when the expected endorsement of the massive Service Employees International Union (SEIU) slipped from his grasp. But the Iowa branch of the union is backing him, as of today. And other state councils are likely to come on board as well.
** SCHWARZENEGGER LIVE WEBCASTS THIS MORNING. At 9 AM, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata appear at the Alameda ferry station on San Francisco Bay to discuss transportation emergency preparedness.
At 11:45 AM, Schwarzenegger appears at a groundbreaking ceremony in Solana Beach for a project designed to ease traffic confestion in San Diego’s north coast corridor. The project is part of the massive Big Bang Bonds infrastructure package passed last November.Both events will be webcast live.
** SCHWARZENEGGGER: SIGNINGS AND VETOES. Over the weekend, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger finished signing and vetoing the hundreds of bills left on his desk from this year’s California legislative session. He had until midnight last night to act.
Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill to grant illegal immigrants special financial assistance to attend California’s state universities. He also vetoed a bill that would grant the United Farm Workers official bargaining status at farms without winning a representation election by instead signing up a majority of workers.
He signed bills to ban toys made with the substance phthalate, require pistols sold in the state have cartridge markings to allow police to trace the weapons, and to ban the use of lead ammunition in the habitat of the endangered California condor.
Trans fats will now be eliminated from food sold on campuses and bottled water manufacturers will be required to disclose the source of their water on bottle labels. But he vetoed a bill requiring disclosure of food products from cloned animals. Schwarzenegger also signed a bill hiking the vehicle license fee by $11 and the drivers license fee by $1 to finance alterntive energy research & development.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia is fast re-emerging as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is quite interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window. Moscow time is 11 hours ahead of Pacific time.
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