Elections Blog

Now, don’t think I’m being coy here, because this number is truly horrific, but bear with me:
The United Nations said Wednesday that 3,709 Iraqi civilians were killed in October, the highest monthly toll since the March 2003 U.S. invasion and another sign of the severity of Iraq’s sectarian bloodbath.
The toll, and the accompanying article, are [...]

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…though whether Hezbollah and Syria can throw up enough obstructions to prevent it is still in the air:
The agreement by the U.N. and the Lebanese government, announced last week by Annan, would create a tribunal outside Lebanon with a majority of international judges and an international prosecutor. Annan said having more international than Lebanese judges [...]

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Has Tony Blair gone wobbly in calling for dialogue with Syria and Iran (in a prelude to what is widely expected to be a similar call in the Iraq Study Group report)?  It’s not as bad as you think…and it’s worse than you think.
The overall approach is entirely sensible.  Said Blair:
“It is a perfectly straightforward [...]

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…and I’m not talking about Iraq.  First, Hamas makes it clear that it is perfectly content to let the Palestinian people suffer rather than give Israel the barest shred of compromise:
The ruling Islamic group Hamas said on Tuesday a planned Palestinian unity government would not recognize Israel or accept a two-state solution to the Middle [...]

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Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is in Washington this week and sat down for a Q&A with Newsweek.  Interesting exchange on Iran:
How do you see the threat posed by Iran?
President Ahmadinejad is a man who is ready to commit crimes against humanity, and he has to be stopped. My position is clear. If there can [...]

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One thing is clear: John Bolton WILL NOT be confirmed as UN Ambassador (remember, he was a recess appointment - if he couldn’t through under better circumstances, he won’t get through now).
We also are saying goodbye to a good man who did a LOT for the Republican Party.  Ken Mehlman was widely rumored to be [...]

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The bad news is very bad, indeed, and the Washington Post is right on the money:
THE MOST critical question following North Korea’s reported nuclear test is whether anything can be done to stop other states or terrorist groups from acquiring such weapons in coming years. Can North Korea be prevented from exporting its nukes? Is [...]

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Thank God that at least some action is being taken:
The U.N. Security Council on Saturday unanimously agreed to sanctions against North Korea in response to the country’s claimed nuclear test.
The vote was scheduled soon after negotiators agreed on the sticking point of cargo inspections, the language over which China had expressed some concerns earlier.
Rather than [...]

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It is with a heavy heart and a tightening of the chest that I note that today’s scheduled UN vote on North Korean sanction is in danger of being torpedoed by Russia and China:
Despite winning key concessions, Russia and China raised new objections that could delay a vote Saturday on a U.N. Security Council resolution [...]

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Sources are leaking results that indicate no radiation from the North Korean explosion last weekend:
Results from an initial air sampling after North Korea’s announced nuclear test showed no evidence of radioactive particles that would be expected from a large nuclear detonation, a U.S. government intelligence official said Friday.
The test results do not necessarily mean the [...]

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…looks like it may yet pass without incident.  Through the Chinese, the North Koreans are hinting that if the U.S. wants to give in to blackmail, they’ll find a welcoming talking partner, while Claudia Rosett notes the latest scarifying warning from the UN…

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This dedication goes out to Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, who is really having a bad couple of weeks, what with his anti-Semite campaign against George Allen, and now his incredibly self-serving, preposterous inability to say one good thing about his own President, even when said President is under attack by the thuggish buffoon Hugo Chavez:
I just [...]

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Where is the will of the international community to get the Israeli prisoners back? I don’t see them, do you? Wasn’t that a condition of the ceasefire? And is Hamas Hezbollah out of southern Lebanon?
Of course not, and no serious person thought any of the above would happen, because everyone - EVERYONE - knows the [...]

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Those of us who hope for a peaceful two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have been burned so many times that it’s well-nigh impossible to get our hopes up again, but if it should come to fruition, this would be pretty significant:
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told the U.N. General Assembly on Thursday that the planned national [...]

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Scott Sagan thinks he has the answer to the most vexing foreign policy question of the day:
…[A]ny deal with Iran must be structured in a series of steps, each offering a package of economic benefits (light-water reactors, aircraft parts, or status at the World Trade Organization) in exchange for constraints placed on Iran’s future nuclear [...]

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It’s the clearest sign yet that the recent war was a major defeat for Israel; I don’t know what is more odious, the thought that Israel has to pay ransom, or the thought that it is the UN that will decide how much the ransom is:
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Monday that Israel and Hezbollah [...]

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Ultimatums sure aren’t what they used to be:
EUROPEAN Union foreign ministers agreed today to take two more weeks to try to clarify Iran’s stance on halting sensitive nuclear work after Tehran ignored a UN deadline to stop uranium enrichment.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana will meet Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, in Europe early [...]

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Sometimes moral clarity is not fun, but as usual, Hitchens is right:
[Iran]‘s been gearing up already with a conflict with the European Union first, to whom it lied repeatedly about its enrichment and other activities.  It is lying internationally through the U.N. 
No, of course, the Russians won‘t support the U.S. call for sanctions.  No, [...]

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David Ignatius says that behind Iran’s defiance of the UN lies a belief that it is ascending as America declines:
Behind President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s defiant rhetoric lies a conviction that is widely shared here: Iran is a rising power in the Middle East while the United States is in decline — and now is the moment [...]

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If you are old enough to remember, during the height of the Cold War, the concept of the ‘nuclear clock’ was popular.  The idea was that when it struck midnight, the world would blow up in a nuclear holocaust, and it was always about three seconds until midnight.  Then, when the Soviet Union imploded, all [...]

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