Recently in World at Large Category

"'We played with great character in one of the great games in international basketball history, I think,' U.S. coach Mike Krzyzewski said." Congrats to the US men's Olympic basketball team, who returned to golden form this morning by closing out Spain 118-107. (Now, Coach D'Antoni, get thee to the Knickerbockers. We have work to do!)

"How could Saakashvili have made such a catastrophic misjudgment? The answer is that he stepped into an elephant trap set for him by Russia. Moscow-backed Ossetian rebels had been provoking the Georgians for weeks with artillery attacks and raids. Saakashvili took the bait. He sent in his army for an all-out grab. But the Georgian offensive gave Russia just the excuse it needed to send troops and tanks into Ossetia. More importantly, the fact that Georgia launched the first attack has robbed Saakashvili of the moral high ground...Russia has once again proved itself a master of the brutal art of colonial politics."

As Russian President Medvedev announces he is halting military operations (although, apparently, not quite yet), the Daily Mail's Owen Matthews explains what's happened in Georgia...and what's at stake. "The only non-Russian controlled oil pipeline from Central Asia and the Caucasus runs from Azerbaijan through Georgian territory to the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan...It is too late for Russia to do anything to stop the existing pipelines -- but a destabilised Georgia would doubtless undermine Western confidence in non-Russian gas supplies...[In addition] It's impossible that NATO will accept Georgia as a member as long as its rebel regions are occupied by Russian troops - so in invading South Ossetia, Russia has effectively drawn a line beyond which NATO cannot expand."

"'I expressed my grave concern about the disproportionate response of Russia,' Bush said. 'We strongly condemn bombing outside of South Ossetia.'" As Georgian forces pull back from South Ossetia in the face of a full-scale Russian assault, the US, UN, and European Commission increasingly condemn Russian attacks across all of Georgia.

Meanwhile, Medvedev argues that Russian operations are winding down, but that troops will stay in South Ossetia for awhile. "Anatoly Nogovitsyn, a colonel-general on Russia's General Staff, said at a Moscow news briefing that Russia was not intending 'to invade Georgia' and that a 'key principle' of the current operation was that troops remain inside South Ossetia -- ostensibly to protect a population it said was under assault by the Georgian military, as well as its own peacekeepers stationed there." Update: Russia pushes into Georgia.

After stops in Kuwait, Afghanistan, Iraq, Jordan, and Israel, Sen. Obama takes his message to the heart of Berlin, before a crowd of over 200,000 at the Brandenburg Gate. [Video | Transcript.] As Der Spiegel's chief foreign desk editor put it after the speech: "No. 44 has spoken."

Well, let's make sure we all do our part on Election Day first. Still, it's safe to say the Obama World Tour has been knocked out of the park so far. Between this and Iraq's backing of the Obama plan earlier in the week, McCain's chances are, at least to my mind, looking downright dismal these days. And whining about the press, a.k.a. the mythical maverick's former "base", isn't going to right the ship for the GOP. Yep, all in all, things are looking pretty good for November...and beyond.

(By the way, when Sen. Obama isn't making the case for world peace, he's also got a pretty sweet jumper.)

As I'm sure you've heard, Central China experienced a devastating earthquake today, killing thousands. This follows the nightmare cyclone in Burma (not Myanmar), a.k.a. Katrina writ large, which may now have claimed upwards of 100,000 lives. [Donations.] As with the 2004 tsunami, it seems almost criminally obtuse to keep nattering on about superdelegates and movie trailers while such large-scale catastrophes are unfolding. But, what is there to do?

How do you say "St. Patrick's Day" in Spanish? A very happy Cinco de Mayo to you and yours.

"The meeting was an error in judgment that will not be repeated, and I am sorry for it." Clinton consigliere and inveterate torturer of reason Mark Penn gets into trouble for playing both sides of a Colombian trade deal, is forced to apologize, and subsequently gets sacked by the nation in question. If only Sen. Clinton had followed Colombia's example months ago, she might still have a shot at the presidency right now.

In related news, Al Giordano of Rural Votes explains why Colombian president Alvaro Uribe is rooting against Obama, and why that speaks strongly in the Illinois Senator's favor. "The Uribe regime, after all, continues a chummy friendship with Bill Clinton, granting him the government’s 'Colombia Is Passion' Award last June. That, during the same 2007 spring when former vice president Al Gore cancelled his appearance at a Miami environmental conference because he did not want to share a podium with Uribe, the hemisphere’s poster boy for state-sponsored terrorism, narco-trafficking, and assassinations of opposition political, labor and social movement leaders."

"The protests, sparked by the anniversary of the failed 1959 uprising that sent Tibet's Dalai Lama into exile, are the latest embarrassment to hit 2008 Olympic-host China." Some deadly (and potentially Olympics-threatening) violence breaks out in Lhasa, Tibet, claiming between 10 and 100 lives (depending on the source.) "Chinese authorities blamed the Dalai Lama for the unrest, but the Dalai Lama said the protesters were simply acting out of 'deep-rooted resentment' of the Chinese government. 'As I have always said, unity and stability under brute force is at best a temporary solution...I therefore appeal to the Chinese leadership to stop using force and address the long-simmering resentment of the Tibetan people through dialogue with the Tibetan people. I also urge my fellow Tibetans not to resort to violence.'"

Reporting from China, the Atlantic's James Fallows says the news isn't really getting past the Great Firewall...yet.

"Depending on how you look at it, the Chinese government’s attempt to rein in the Internet is crude and slapdash or ingenious and well crafted. When American technologists write about the control system, they tend to emphasize its limits. When Chinese citizens discuss it—at least with me—they tend to emphasize its strength. All of them are right, which makes the government’s approach to the Internet a nice proxy for its larger attempt to control people’s daily lives."

Forget Ohio and Texas, Sen. Clinton...Want to see a "real" firewall in use? The Atlantic's James Fallows explains the nature and workings of China's "Great Firewall." "What the government cares about is making the quest for information just enough of a nuisance that people generally won’t bother...When this much is available inside the Great Firewall, why go to the expense and bother, or incur the possible risk, of trying to look outside? All the technology employed by the Golden Shield, all the marvelous mirrors that help build the Great Firewall—these and other modern achievements matter mainly for an old-fashioned and pre-technological reason. By making the search for external information a nuisance, they drive Chinese people back to an environment in which familiar tools of social control come into play."

It's not just here at home. Sen. Obama takes the Americans Abroad primary 2-1 (65%-32%), winning most of the countries around the world (Ex-pats in Israel and the Philippines opted for Clinton.) Thanks, Kris, and all the other Obama voters out there across the seas. Update: Clinton did well in the DR as well.

"To my close compatriots...I say that I will not aspire to nor accept -- I repeat, I will not aspire to nor accept -- the office of President of the Council of State or Commander in Chief." After nearly fifty years in power, Fidel Castro steps down in Cuba. Hopefully, this will encourage our leaders to begin advocating a more reasonable and sane policy towards our neighbor in the Caribbean.

"Today’s American system values upheaval; it’s been a while since we’ve seen too much of it. But Americans who lived through the Depression knew the pain real disruption can bring. Today’s Chinese, looking back on their country’s last century, know, too. With a lack of tragic imagination, Americans have drifted into an arrangement that is comfortable while it lasts, and could last for a while more. But not much longer." The Atlantic's James Fallows examines the unstable financial codependence between China and the United States, and how it could all too easily unravel. "Lawrence Summers calls today’s arrangement 'the balance of financial terror,' and says that it is flawed in the same way that the 'mutually assured destruction' of the Cold War era was...With allowances for hyperbole, something similar applies to the dollar standoff. China can’t afford to stop feeding dollars to Americans, because China’s own dollar holdings would be devastated if it did. As long as that logic holds, the system works. As soon as it doesn’t, we have a big problem." Update: Make that 1.53 trillion.

"The Berliner Morgenpost over the weekend ran with the headline, 'The New Kennedy.' The tabloid Bild went with, "This Black American Has Become the New Kennedy!'" Speaking of JFK, it seems Iowa and (hopefully) New Hampshire are not alone. Obama-mania is sweeping Germany. "An editorial in the Frankfurter Rundschau went one historic president better with a headline that read simply: 'Lincoln, Kennedy, Obama,' adding that 'hope and optimism' are 'the source of the nation's strength.'" (I was going to say something along the lines of "But is Obama a jelly donut?" As I just discovered, though, that oft-told "Berliner" gaffe may not be true.)

"When she saw William playing a game after lunch at Sandringham she thought the Nintendo looked tremendous fun and begged to join in. She played a simple ten-pin bowling game and by all accounts was a natural." Hey, Helen Mirren, how much ya bowl? By way of Web Goddess, it seems Queen Elizabeth has taken to the Wii. "Although she is 81 the Queen's hand-eye co-ordination was as good as somebody half her age...She showed all the signs of becoming a Nintendo addict."

Just in case you were lacking for things to do this New Years' Eve, two rather addictive online games: First up, Desktop Tower Defense, which my family spent a good deal of time on over the Christmas break. Second, Travelpod's Traveler IQ Challenge, a test your geography knowledge sorta thing. So long, Spider Solitaire.

Benazir Bhutto, 1953-2007. It seems all too many christmases of late has been marked by grim news on the global front, from the devastating tsunami to the botched Saddam execution. This year, obviously, it was the assassination of the former prime minister who, while no angel, nevertheless embodied for many hopes for a stable, democratic Pakistan. Her murder -- in the military stronghold of Rawalpindi, no less -- further destabilizes a nuclear-armed nation already teetering on the brink, and roils significantly the Dubya administration's fatally flawed approach to the country. Let's just hope Bhutto isn't remembered as the next Franz Ferdinand.

"The consequences of Bush and Rice's passivity were disastrous. Israel didn't lose the war, but it didn't win, either, and that's what it had to do to maintain its image of invincibility, which has long deterred hostile neighbors from contemplating aggression. Hezbollah didn't win, but all it had to do was not lose, and it clearly achieved that goal, enhancing its reputation as the power that had stood up to the Zionists and faced them down." In his discussion of the recent Mideast summit in Annapolis (which publicly aimed to kickstart peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, and privately aimed to pry Syria further away from Iran), Slate's Fred Kaplan brings up a crucial -- and missed -- opportunity for diplomacy last year, during the Israel-Lebanon crisis. "(By the way, this may have been the genesis of a new Israeli verb, lecondel—in Hebrew, 'to Condel,' short for 'to Condoleezza' -- meaning, as the New York Times' Steven Erlanger has explained, to come and go for meetings that produce few results.)" And, speaking of political linguistics, it turns out that Annapolis, however picturesque, might not have been the best place to hold the summit -- In Arabic, "Annapolis" roughly translates to "I am the Police."

"Today the Australian people have decided that we as a nation will move forward." Dubya loses an important conservative ally on the international front as long-standing Australian PM John Howard is voted out of office, to be replaced by Kevin Rudd of the Labor Party. "Rudd, a Chinese-speaking former diplomat, has also promised to sign the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, leaving the U.S. as the only industrialized country not to have joined it...Rudd promised to pull Australia's 550 combat troops from Iraq in a phased withdrawal, and to quickly sign Kyoto. Howard had rejected withdrawal plans for Australia's troops in Iraq, and refused to ratify the pact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions." Ozzie ozzie ozzie! Welcome back to the reality-based community, y'all (and here's hoping we catch up with you next year.)

"'The train is derailed and off the tracks,' said Stephen P. Cohen, author of 'The Idea of Pakistan.' 'We have to give ourselves a share of the responsibility for this. We placed all of our chips on Musharraf.' At this point, Cohen added: 'I don't think there is anything we can do. We are not big players in this anymore.'" Dubya diplomacy takes another huge hit as a power-hungry President Musharraf declares martial law in Pakistan to ensure his continued reign, sparking nationwide protests and leaving the Bushies between a rock and a hard place. "One adviser traveling with Rice saw a silver lining in the rapid turn of events. 'Thank heavens for small favors,' the official said. Compared to Pakistan, 'Iraq looks pretty good.'" Oh, joy.

Update: Slate's Fred Kaplan weighs in. "The state of emergency in Pakistan signals yet another low point in President George W. Bush's foreign policy -- a stark demonstration of his paltry influence and his bankrupt principles. More than that, the crackdown locks us in a crisis -- a potentially dangerous dynamic -- from which there appears to be no escape route...The Bush foreign policy was neither shrewd enough to play self-interested power politics nor truly principled enough to enforce its ideals."

I've been derelict in posting here the past week, but obviously there've been some pretty dismal stories in the news of late, from the fiery swath of destruction visited upon California to the horrifying house fire that claimed seven South Carolinians. To those who've lost friends or family (or homes) in the recent conflagrations, my heart goes out to you. (And one bright spot amid the tales of woe, congrats to the 2007 BoSox for their second World Series sweep this decade. The Curse is now assuredly laid to rest.)

"If you're really worried about Iran, do you want to put your faith in the United States, the country that bungled Iraq? If you really care about Islamic fundamentalism, do you want to be led by the country that, distracted by Iraq, failed to predict the return of the Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan?" Why has the world soured on America of late? The real reason, argues Slate's Anne Applebaum and the data she surveys, is that, thanks to seven years of Dubya, we're starting to look incompetent. "And even if the surge works, even if the roadside bombs vanish, inept is a word that will always be used about the Iraqi invasion."

"'The British have basically been defeated in the south,' a senior U.S. intelligence official said recently in Baghdad. They are abandoning their former headquarters at Basra Palace, where a recent official visitor from London described them as 'surrounded like cowboys and Indians' by militia fighters." More bad news in Iraq: Once considered a comparative success story of sorts, the formerly British-held city of Basra now seems to be deteriorating as quickly as the rest of Iraq (except that, rather than experiencing sectarian conflict between Shiites and Sunnis, the more homogenous Basra is witnessing Shiite militias struggling amongst themselves.) "Much of Basra's violence is 'over who gets what cut from Iraq's economic resources,' a U.S. Army strategist in Iraq said."

"The resolution allows the use of force in self-defense, to ensure freedom of movement for humanitarian workers and to protect civilians under attack." In a unanimous vote, the UN Security Council agrees to send 26,000 peace-keeping troops and police -- a UN-AU hybrid force known as Unamid -- to Darfur. "Ban Ki-moon , the UN Secretary-General, called the move a 'historic and unprecedented operation' that will send 'a clear and powerful signal' of help to the people of Darfur." That being said, many observers -- among them Sen. Russ Feingold -- feel this version of the resolution has been excessively watered down to appease the Sudanese government: "If this UN resolution is passed as it currently stands, we can expect the Sudanese government to try to evade its requirements and agreements without a single consequence. Should that happen, the toll of the genocide in Darfur will continue to mount -- in lives lost, in persons displaced, and in fundamental human values that the international community has failed to uphold."

"Call it the 'special relationship'; call it, as Churchill did, the 'joint inheritance'; call it, when we meet, as a form of homecoming, as President Reagan did. The strength of this relationship...is not just built on the shared problems that we have to deal with together or on the shared history, but is built...on shared values." Wanna know who (is Mr Brown)? So does Dubya...The new British prime minister and Bush held their first joint press conference yesterday (transcript), and -- so far -- it's all smiles. Still, "[t]he British leader did not hide his differences with the president, describing Afghanistan as 'the front line against terrorism.'...[He also] avoided using the phrase "war on terror" in describing the effort to hunt down and defeat Islamic radicals. He referred to terrorism 'as a crime' and 'not a cause,' though he went on to say that 'there should be no safe haven and no hiding place for those who practice terrorist violence or preach terrorist extremism.'"

"I wish everyone, friend or foe, well. And that is that -- the end." So long, Tony (and good luck in the Middle East.) 'We're very glad to see him go, because he's the most dangerous opponent that we've had in a couple of hundred years,' former Conservative leader William Hague told the BBC afterward.'" That may have been true for awhile, I guess. Too bad Blair decided to pull an LBJ and mar his otherwise-sound progressive legacy with an exceedingly ill-advised foreign war. But, time marches onward, so, with that in mind, Hello to Gordie and the New Labor Order.

"I am going to say something that few people in public life will say, but most know is absolutely true: a vast aspect of our jobs today - outside of the really major decisions, as big as anything else - is coping with the media, its sheer scale, weight and constant hyperactivity. At points, it literally overwhelms." In his final weeks as prime minister, Tony Blair addresses the problem of the media, calling it "like a feral beast, just tearing people and reputations to bits." (Full text of remarks.) "The result is a media that increasingly and to a dangerous degree is driven by 'impact'. Impact is what matters. It is all that can distinguish, can rise above the clamour, can get noticed. Impact gives competitive edge. Of course the accuracy of a story counts. But it is secondary to impact. It is this necessary devotion to impact that is unravelling standards, driving them down, making the diversity of the media not the strength it should be but an impulsion towards sensation above all else."

I wouldn't say the feral beast metaphor gets right at it -- until last year, most of the major news media, in this country at least, was rather well domesticated: It let Dubya lie his way through just about anything, including building a case for war in Iraq on false pretenses, with impunity. But, clearly something is broken with "this relationship between public life and media," as Blair put it. In the midst of a conflict that's been dragging on longer than World War II, you're still likely to hear more about Paris Hilton's jail travails (Prison sucks? Our criminal justice system tends to favor the wealthy? Who knew?), Don Imus's racist bromides (A bile-spewing racist on talk radio? Wherever did they find him?), or the winner of American Idol, to take only three recent examples, than anything of use about the status of the conflict, or our actions, there. And even coverage of the horrifying tragedy at Virginia Tech, obviously a legitimate news story, descended into exploitation almost immediately (and provoked very little understanding that this level of tragedy has become virtually a daily occurrence in Iraq.) They're just giving us what they want, I suspect the comeback is, and that's almost assuredly true. But, still, it'd be nice to see a little more daily recognition from our major journalistic outlets that the mass media in our society performs a crucial -- if not the crucial -- function in informing the electorate on current events and providing the information indispensable to maintaining an active, responsive citizenry, and that other factors should come into play in their coverage than just the corporate bottom line. Update: From the press box, Slate's Jack Shafer cries foul.

"Dmitri Trenin, deputy director of the Carnegie Endowment's Moscow center, put it well in an insightful article in Foreign Affairs, published a year ago. 'Until recently,' he wrote, 'Russia saw itself as Pluto in the Western solar system, very far from the center but still fundamentally a part of it. Now it has left that orbit entirely. Russia's leaders have given up on becoming part of the West and have started creating their own Moscow-centered system.'" With Dubya on the road for the G8 summit, Slate's Fred Kaplan surveys the state of US-Russian relations, concluding that "something is happening...[but w]e're not -- or at least there's nothing inevitable about our becoming -- enemies."

"Within the next few weeks I won't be the prime minister of this country. In all probability a Scot will become prime minister of this country and that's someone who built one of the strongest economies in the world and who I've always said would make a great prime minister." With recent tough defeats for Labor in Scotland punctuating his closing weeks, Tony Blair announces he will make an announcement tomorrow concerning his forthcoming resignation and likely replacement by Chancellor Gordon Brown. And, across the channel, France elects Nicolas Sarkozy as its new president, a conservative who's seen as both US-friendly and Dubya-friendly. Meanwhile, E.J. Dionne wonders what recent events mean for European -- and American -- progressives. Update: Tony Blair announces his last day: June 27.

"'He was a remarkable man who saw the need for democratic and economic reform and in defending it played a vital role at a crucial time in Russia's history,' Blair said." Boris Yeltsin, 1931-2007.

In the deadliest act of school violence in American history, at least 33 people lie dead at Virginia Tech after what was presumably a jilted student's bloody shooting rampage."'It is difficult to comprehend senseless violence on this scale,' said Virginia's Governor Timothy M. Kaine in a statement."

And, as details from this story emerge, I've been catching up over at Medley on the recent nightmare befalling blogger Kathy Sierra, who's been the recipient of sexually repugnant death threats as a result of her posting on, of all things, tech issues. (Not to say that posting on anything else would justify the depraved sexist bile thrown her way, but I've sadly come to half-expect that sort of vileness from Freepers, the uglier elements of dKos, and the like.) I guess I shouldn't be all that surprised by the disgusting misogyny pervading this latter incident -- it's sorta like people acting surprised that we've found a racist in our midst in Don Imus, as if bigoted old white guys in positions of power were a dwindling species or something. And, true, these two events have little or nothing to do with each other, except that I'm finding out about them at the same time. Still, I have to say, sometimes all the rage, ugliness, and despair that seems to lurk just under the brittle crust of our society is overwhelmingly disheartening. Let's get it together, people. To go back to Auden again, we must love one another or die.

Update: Exhibit C in today's litany of horrors, this ghastly assault on a Columbia Journalism grad student, which occurred not more than twenty blocks from here over the weekend. Sweet merciful Jesus, this is a sick, sick world sometimes. Update 2: They got him.

How does it feel when your heart grows cold? Statisticians have deemed today "Blue Monday," the most depressing day of the year. Um, if you say so. Clearly, these geniuses have never heard of Valentine's Day.

Other important leadership shifts, these in and around New York: Having officially replaced Kofi Annan at the UN earlier this week, new general secretary Ban Ki-Moon cleans house, announces his own team and sets the Darfur crisis as a top priority. And, over in Albany, New York governor (and future presidential contender?) Elliot Spitzer delivers both his first Inaugural [text] and his first State of the State [PDF]: "In an hourlong address that was largely a repudiation of the policies of his predecessor, George E. Pataki, the new governor said he would seek to broadly overhaul the state's ethics and lobbying rules. He said he would make prekindergarten available to all 4-year-olds by the end of his term, overhaul the public authorities that control most of the state's debt and make New York more inviting to business by reducing the cost of workers' compensation."

So, as I'm guessing you probably heard, Saddam was hung [obit]. Well, as a long-delayed deliverance of justice visited upon a bloodthirsty and sadistic tyrant, the execution may have been a success. But as a piece of political theater and a symbolic and unifying act of statebuilding, it definitely left something to be desired. Unfortunately, even notwithstanding the poorly-timed Shiite revelry, the hanging came across on tape less as a dispassionate exercise by the new Iraqi State than a heated episode of sectarian vigilantism, one that may grant Saddam more power in martyrdom than he's had in life since his capture. Something to consider if and when Osama Bin Laden is ever brought to justice...

"Thematically, it's about the very simple idea that, in this Postmodern world of ours, human beings -- all of us -- are worth less. We're worth less every day, despite the fact that some of us are achieving more and more. It's the triumph of capitalism...The show is written in a 21st-century city-state that is incredibly bureaucratic, and in which a legal pursuit of an unenforceable prohibition has created great absurdity."

Slate publishes a fascinating extended interview with Wire creator David Simon, which touches on, among other things, why there won't be a Season 6 focusing on Latino immigrants, and what we can expect from Season 5. "Yes, the last season. The last theme is basically asking the question, why aren't we paying attention? If we got everything right in the last four seasons in depicting this city-state, how is it that these problems -- which have been attendant problems regardless of who is in power -- how is it that they endure? That brings into mind one last institution, which is the media. What are we paying attention to?" I can't say it enough -- if you're not paying attention to The Wire, you owe it to yourself to rent Season 1 and start playing catch-up next to immediately. It really is far and away the best show on television, perhaps ever. Certainly, it's the savviest take on American politics ever put to the small screen.

Jeffrey Sachs, take note: A new report finds that the best way to get the US to pony up some foreign aid for impoverished nations is to get that country on the Security Council, and pronto. "A two-year seat on the Security Council, for instance, can generate a 59 percent spike in U.S. assistance, according to a study by two Harvard University scholars that tracked U.S. economic and military assistance from 1946 to 2001. In times of crisis, U.S. aid to some member countries has increased by as much as 170 percent. Those aid levels tend to recede after the country leaves the 15-nation council." So, great news, Panama...You just hit the jackpot.

"So, here we are. The two major powers in this confrontation are led by blunderers; the provocateur is a chronic miscalculator. It doesn't look good." Oh, so there's the WMD: As John Bolton pushes for aggressive sanctions at the UN against the Kim Jong-Il regime, Slate's Fred Kaplan parses several ugly scenarios that could unfold after North Korea's nuclear gamble on Monday (the same day, coincidentally, that South Korean Ban Ki-moon won official Security Council backing to replace Kofi Annan. Looks like he'll be working overtime right out of the box.) By the way, if you're keeping score at home, Dubya & co. now seem to have grievously mishandled all three prongs of the "axis of evil" trifecta. Sigh. That's great, it starts with an earthquake...

Meanwhile, back on Earth, the Security Council seemingly decides on Ban Ki-Moon, South Korea's foreign minister, to replace Kofi Annan as the next general secretary of the United Nations. Ban's closest rival, India's Shashi Tharoor, has conceded the race...Official word comes next Monday.

A very happy Labor Day to you and yours.

More grim news in the world-going-to-hell-in-a-handbasket department: So, obviously, there now seems to be a full-fledged firing war going on between Israel and Hezbollah, one which has already set back Lebanon years and threatens to bring in Syria and Iran as official combatants (a.k.a. Hezbollah's main backers) if it keeps up. For his part, other than having Bolton spike a UN resolution condemning Israel for "disproportionate use of force," Dubya has been basically AWOL in terms of world leadership -- in fact, he's been more effusive about a German pig of late than he has a conflagration that threatens nothing less than full-scale war across the Middle East. Where have you gone Bill Clinton, our nation turns it lowly eyes to you?

"'It's difficult to think of many other times and many other presidencies when so many dangerous events were happening at once,' says Wendy Sherman, a State Department official under President Clinton. 'But there's so much going on in every global hot spot because the Bush Administration really opened up Pandora's box with little-to-no plans to support their actions.'" TIME Magazine composes a cover story obit for the Bush doctrine. Good riddance: "As it turns out, Iraq may prove to be not only the first but also the last laboratory for preventive war. Instead of deterring the rulers in Tehran and Pyongyang, the travails of the U.S. occupation may have emboldened those regimes in their quest to obtain nuclear weapons while constraining the U.S. military's ability to deter them."

A belated congrats to Italy on winning the 2006 World Cup. I was rooting for France, and a PK shootout is a truly terrible way to choose the Cup champion, but -- after headbuttgate and the Baggio mishap in 1994 -- Italy seemed karmically due. At any rate, see y'all in 2010. And, now, alas, we've hit the sports dead zone until September...perhaps it's time to give MLS another go, what with Red Bull United now on the pitch... Update: Zidane speaks.

"In buildings like 712 Nostrand Avenue, residents, many of whom are small children or seniors, go for months at a time without heat or hot water in a building that is little more than a sieve, with holes in the walls, dislodged window frames, and the wraith of a roof door off its hinges." Friend, poker buddy, and journalist Olaf Bertram-Nothnagel evalutes the sordid career of Olufemi Falade as part of the Village Voice's Ten Worst Landlords series.

"George Bush's luck hasn't run out just yet. North Korea's Fourth of July missile fizzle is the biggest diplomatic break that the president has caught all term -- and the biggest setback ('catastrophe' wouldn't be too strong a word) that his most-loathed nemesis, Kim Jong-il, has suffered in years." Slate's Fred Kaplan sees good news for the US in yesterday's North Korean rocket launch, as, in effect, "Kim Jong-il shook the dice and rolled craps." Still, "[w]hat happens next is worthy of nail-biting."

A belated happy 230th Independence Day to you and yours, and here's hoping the recent spate of scary news (North Korean missiles, incipent war in Gaza) didn't detract too much from the festivities in your parts. (Also, with regards to more joyous fourth of july rocket launches, congrats to the crew of Discovery STS-121 on a successful return to space yesterday.)