A.J. is right:

While right-wing pundits furiously try to spin Rev. Wright’s comments as speaking for anyone other than Rev. Wright, it’s vital that progressive observers and commentators remember that their machine will do anything — anything — to confuse people and divert attention from the failures of conservative governance. On the economy, on values, on social policy, and, perhaps most of all given the current situation in Iraq, on foreign affairs.

Our policies in Iraq — not to mention places like Pakistan, Indonesia, Somalia, Iran, North Korea — make America and the world a more dangerous place. Expert upon expert and report after report say so, and they’re correct. The right wing wants to tie this common-sense argument to controversial figures so they can marginalize ideas along with individuals, and it’s a smear tactic that can be devastating if people don’t stand up and identify it for what it is. They’re not making substantive critiques, they’re using the politics of destruction and distraction.

The politics of destruction. The politics of distraction. That’s what fuels the Right-Wing Noise Machine–conservatives know that if the election hinges on the issues, they’ll lose. So they try to distract the American people, paying ‘gotcha’ and distracting us from the very real problems we have to face every day.

This is why the right is pushing Wright above the fold day after day:

Bush — not Wright or Bill Clinton — is voters’ main concern

[...]

According to the poll, 73 percent of respondents disapprove of Bush’s handling of the economy and 81 percent believe the United States is in a recession.

[...]

What is your preference for the outcome of this year’s congressional elections––a Congress controlled by Republicans or a Congress controlled by Democrats?

Republican-controlled Congress ……34

Democrat-controlled Congress ……..49

And then there’s this:

The current data show that the most commonly mentioned characteristics about McCain are that he is “too old,” that he is a “good man”/”likable,” that he would give the country more of the same/be another George W. Bush, that he had a good military background, and basic dislike of him.

Interestingly, enough, “Good military background” has actually dropped from 11 percent to 8 percent. His age and the George Bush connection are quickly overshadowing his military service.

The politics of distraction give us headlines like this one:

While Malkin & Co. Continue Endless Circle Jerk On Wright, Deadliest Month Of 2008 In Iraq Gets Worse

The stakes in this election are the highest they’ve been in decades. The economy’s in ruin. Our foreign policy is in shambles. Our military is stretched to the breaking point. Gas prices are at record highs. America is in the midst of a health care crisis. Our deficit is the highest it’s ever been. Our enemies are stronger and our defenses are weaker. We as Americans face some of the biggest issues and the toughest battles of our times; we can’t afford to be distracted.

As I’ve said time and time again, Republicans can’t govern. They controlled all three branches of our government for years–we saw the effects of Republican control, and they were disastrous. They can’t win on the issues, so the GOP fires up the Right-Wing Noise Machine to distract us from the issues and focus us on trivial, pointless nonsense.

This time we can’t afford to fall for it. This time we can’t afford to fall for the politics of distraction. This time we have to stand up and tell them that this will not be tolerated. This time we must stand up and change our country for the better, and we will not let these right-wing charlatans stand in our way.

Enough is enough. Once and for all, enough is enough.

UPDATE: Bob Cesca nails it:

Have You Left No Sense Of Decency?

If the corporate media had been as diligent about watchdogging President Bush as they have been about watchdogging Reverend Wright, it’s very likely we wouldn’t have invaded Iraq.

If the corporate media had spent as much time exposing the obvious flaws and grotesque inequalities of Reaganomics throughout the last 30 years as they’ve spent on Wright, we wouldn’t necessarily be staring into the maw of another depression.

If the corporate media were as diligent about debunking the lies surrounding Iran’s so-called nuclear program as they’ve been about Wright, there wouldn’t be such a sense of inevitability in terms of attacking — or entirely obliterating — Iran.

[...]

So I have to ask the appropriate network executives the familiar yet appropriate question: Have you no sense of decency at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?

Recently, John McCain has promised to eliminate all Congressional earmarks, no questions asked.

Sounds like a good plan to eliminate wasteful spending, right? Wrong. As it turns out, there are some important programs that are paid for with earmarks.

Like military aid to Israel and Egypt:

Some observers define earmarks in a more limited way, identifying only provisions that direct spending for items not requested by the Administration or in excess of levels proposed for activities or countries. Although many Foreign Operations earmarks fall within this more narrow definition, congressional directives specifying spending amounts that are the same as shown in the Administration’s illustrative listing for country distributions also are regarded as earmarks. Annual earmarks for economic and military aid to Israel and Egypt are examples of such directives.

Earmarks also pay for military housing:

The Congressional Research Service analysis counts not only the [military] family housing units added by Congress as earmarks but also those requested by the Pentagon and the White House.

CRS identified $6.6 billion in spending in the 2005 Military Construction Appropriation bill associated with earmarks. This included 205 units at Fort Huachuca at a cost of $41 million and 250 units at Davis-Monthan Air Base at a cost $48.5 million—both in McCain’s home state of Arizona.

So either McCain is going to cut aid to Israel, military housing, and other important programs that are funded by earmarks (all to pay for his corporate tax cut), or he’s going to break his campaign promise.

As Politico’s Ben Smith says, “That’s one thing about spending cuts: Much harder when you get to the details.”

McCain can’t even be bothered to read his own plan–how is he supposed to be President, again?

John McCain has some problems to deal with.

First, his latest FEC report shows his campaign violating the $54 million fundraising limit set by campaign finance laws. McCain opted into the public financing system months ago; by exceeding this limit, he has broken the very campaign finance reform laws he shepherded through Congress in 2002.

Then again, this isn’t unexpected. On this issue, McCain declared that the laws don’t apply to him–that he’s no longer restricted by public financing limits. Unfortunately for him, this isn’t his decision to make–McCain opted into public financing (receiving benefits such as money and ballot access) and he can’t pull out until and unless the FEC agrees.

A month ago, the FEC sent McCain a letter:

The nation’s top federal election official told Sen. John McCain yesterday that he cannot immediately withdraw from the presidential public financing system as he had requested, a decision that threatens to dramatically restrict his spending until the general election campaign begins in the fall.

[...]

The implications of that could be dramatic. Last year, when McCain’s campaign was starved for cash, he applied to join the financing system to gain access to millions of dollars in federal matching money. He was also permitted to use his FEC certification to bypass the time-consuming process of gathering signatures to get his name on the ballot in several states, including Ohio

[...]

By signing up for matching money, McCain agreed to adhere to strict state-by-state spending limits and an overall limit on spending of $54 million for the primary season, which lasts until the party’s nominating convention in September. The general election has a separate public financing arrangement.

[...]

Knowingly violating the spending limit is a criminal offense that could put McCain at risk of stiff fines and up to five years in prison.

In response to John McCain breaking campaign finance laws, the DNC filed an FEC complaint. In addition, a number of progressive bloggers also filed an FEC complaint; they’re coupling it with a petition, which you can sign here.

Second, McCain gave what was billed as a major foreign policy speech yesterday. Unfortunately for him, it was light on specifics, and the policies he actually proposed were more than lacking.

McCain echoed George W. Bush’s rhetoric on Iraq, casting the war as a choice between staying the course and winning or ‘cutting and running’ and surrendering to Al-Qaeda. Middle East expert and former Ambassador Marc Ginsberg had this to say about McCain’s false choice:

The trouble with this set up is that McCain’s core premise is dead wrong. By our own senior commanders’ accounts, Al Qaeda is but a minor player in Iraq, and there is no way the U.S. presence, surge or not, that will keep a lid on sectarian tensions. Just look at what is going on in Iraq at the very tragic milestone of 4,000 Americans killed: the worst sectarian violence in months has broken out with hundreds of lives lost despite a McCain’s surge that he continues to tout as the fire extinguisher that will stop sectarian strife from igniting once again.

McCain proposed forming a ‘League of Democracies,’ a new international institution that would provide political cover for whatever disastrous foreign policies a McCain presidency would come up with.

But the League of Democracies would be the ‘Coalition of the Willing’ by a different name, made up of countries trying to curry our favor by rubber-stamping our foreign policy decisions, no matter how idiotic or ill-fated. In other words, it would be the exact kind of wrong-headed ad-hoc alliance that helped get us into Iraq in the first place.

In addition, the League of Democracies would be a formalized version of Bush’s cowboy diplomacy–it would institutionalize our current foreign policy, which ignores and marginalizes any country that doesn’t follow our foreign policy directives. Much like the Bush presidency, this plan will both galvanize and unite America’s enemies, creating a dangerous, unstable bi-polar world.

Ambassador Ginsberg says it best:

What is so strikingly and inherently wrong with McCain’s world vision is that America’s global leadership will not be restored by ignoring adversaries that, left to their own devices, may further challenge and undermine America’s national security.

If this is the kind of foreign policy insight 25 years in Congress gets you, then I’d say Barack Obama has a point.

Third, McCain’s speech invoked this gem from his childhood:

When I was five years old, a car pulled up in front of our house in New London, Connecticut, and a Navy officer rolled down the window, and shouted at my father that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor.

Good God, John McCain remembers Pearl Harbor. Nothing like reminding the American people that, if elected, you would be the oldest President in American history.

Along those lines, take this quote from a McCain staffer:

If America is looking for a second term of the Jimmy Carter Administration of high taxes at home and weakness abroad vote Obama. I doubt they are.

Looking over the 2000 census numbers, roughly half of the voting-age population in the United States is 40 years or younger. If you’re 40 today, that means you were born in 1967 or 1968; since Jimmy Carter left office in January, 1977, it stands to reason that if you’re 40 or below, you probably don’t remember very much about the Carter administration.

So the McCain campaign is invoking the Carter administration, despite the fact that nearly half of America’s voting-age population aren’t old enough to even remember it. (Hell, I wasn’t even born until the Reagan years)

Of course, there’s a good way to re-work that quote to make it more recent…and more accurate:

If America is looking for a second term of the [George Bush] Administration of [economic devastation] at home and weakness abroad vote [McCain]. I doubt they are.

There. Perfect.

Ilan Goldenberg at Democracy Arsenal explains the connection between the Mahdi Army’s ceasefire and the reduction of violence in Iraq:

The drop in violence in Iraq has generally been attributed to four elements 1) More American forces and the change in tactics to counterinsurgency; 2) The Awakening movement; 3) The Sadr ceasfire; and 4) The ethnic cleansing and physical separation of the various sides.

It’s hard to say for sure, which of these factors was the most important. The Bush Administration will tell you it’s all about the troop levels. I’ve tended to believe it’s more of a mix and was most inclined towards the Anbar Awakening and the sectarian cleansing as the important factors. But when you look at the data it really seems to indicate that the Sadr ceasefire may have been the key.

[...]

If you look at the graph that MNF-I has been using on civilian casualties [available here] it looks to tell a pretty clear story. The first major drop in violence came in early 2007 before the troop surge. It looks like it was mostly based on the fact that the worst of the sectarian cleansing in Baghdad had been completed

[...]

The second drop in violence came in September. By that time the full surge had already been in effect for 2-3 months and the Awakening had been going on for a year. The Sadr ceasefire occured on August 28 and suddenly boom a big drop in violence. That could be a coincidence and it could be that all four factors came together. But the data seems to point to the fact that the Sadr Ceasefire more then anything else is what caused the drop in violence in the early fall.

[Emphasis added]

So data from the Multinational Force in Iraq (MNF-I) shows that, to a large extent, the Mahdi Army’s ceasefire played a major role in the drop-off in casualties and violence since the end of summer. Now that they’re once again clashing with both U.S. and Iraqi forces, will violence go up to where it was in August?

The major question is, what sparked the Mahdi Army to take up arms once again after over seven months of a successful ceasefire? Well, Iraqi’s security forces began cracking down on Sadrists for, ostensibly, political & sectarian reasons. Eric Martin explains:

It is no secret that America’s main ally in Iraq (and Iran’s), the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI), is likely to lose ground to the more popular Sadrist current in the upcoming provincial elections (the Sadrist current boycotted the 2005 round). Absent some extracurricular activities to level the playing field that is. As Cernig noted quoting an AP article on Friday, ISCI, whose Iran-trained militia (the Badr Corp.) has heavily infiltrated Iraqi Security Forces, has been moving aggressively (in tandem with US forces) to help overcome what it lacks in popular appeal:

A Sadrist member of parliament alleged that the crackdown in Kut and elsewhere in the south was part of a move by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s Dawa party and [ISCI] to prevent al-Sadr’s followers from winning control of key southern provinces in provincial elections expected this fall.

“They have no supporters in the central and southern provinces, but we do,” Ahmed al-Massoudi told the AP. “If the crackdown against the Sadrists continues, we will begin consultations with other parliamentary blocs to bring down the government and replace it with a genuinely national one.”

So the Iraqi government, fearful of losing ground to the Sadrists in the upcoming election, implemented a crackdown in order to reduce their influence in the upcoming elections, particularly in their strongholds in southern Iraq. Unfortunately, that crackdown pushed the Mahdi Army too far, leading them to violently revolt against the government.

Recently, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki gave the militia three days to lay down their arms:

Clashes continued Wednesday between Iraqi security forces and Shiite militias in the southern city of Basra, as Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki laid down a deadline for gunmen to surrender and fresh rocket attacks hit Baghdad’s Green Zone.

[...]

According to wire service reports, Maliki issued a statement giving gunmen in Basra three days to give up their weapons and renounce further violence. Those who don’t, said a Maliki aide, will be targeted for arrest in the ongoing security operation.

[...]

In a sign of the offensive’s importance, Maliki flew to Basra on Monday to oversee operations.

By Tuesday evening, Iraqi security forces and Shiite militias had also clashed in the cities of Kut and Hilla, as well as outside Sadr’s Baghdad stronghold of Sadr City. Dusk-to-dawn curfews were imposed on at least six cities in southern Iraq, police said.

The head of the Mahdi Army, Moqtada Al-Sadr, hasn’t officially lifted the ceasefire yet, but he has told his followers that they can attack Iraqi and American forces in self-defense. While it’s good news that the ceasefire technically still stands, the bad news is that he gave his followers orders to use violence when necessary. The ceasefire is already crumbling, and it will continue to do so with or without his explicit endorsement–the violence will rage on regardless of what he does.
This is a key test at a critical time in Iraq. While the administration and their Republican allies claim that progress is being made in Iraq, the level of violence remains abysmally high. The fact that Iraq’s security forces went after the Sadrists for political reasons shows that sectarian interests are trumping Iraq’s national interest in the eyes of the government. If Iraq’s security forces can’t put down this armed rebellion, there will be no question that the Republican policies in Iraq have failed.

This is exactly why we need to end the war in Iraq–the Iraqi government has become too reliant on American troops to keep them safe. Five years after the start of the war, the Iraqi government’s crippling dependence on us is shameful; we should have been pushing them towards independence a long time ago. We need to teach the Iraqi government to solve their own problems, and we need to show them that the United States of America isn’t going to stick around and protect them forever.

Iraq has extensive problems and deep divides that can’t be solved with bullets–there needs to be political reconciliation that brings all of Iraq’s major players to the table and charts a course for the future of the country. They need to be able to manage their own factions, to hold their own country together, to provide basic security and stability to their people. Unless we give the Iraqi government a wake-up call and start pushing them in the right direction, every violent flare-up in Iraq will consume more American lives.

UPDATE: More news from the battlefield:

The day saw street battles in Baghdad and Basra, mortar attacks by Shiite rebels against Baghdad’s Green Zone, bombing by U.S. aircraft and encounters that left government tanks in flames. More than 97 people were reported killed and hundreds were wounded since the operation began early Tuesday.

In Baghdad, at least nine Iraqi civilians were killed and 42 were wounded in mortar attacks, police said. The Mahdi Army, loyal to firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtada al Sadr, opened fire on civilians in downtown Baghdad and clashed with Iraqi security forces in Kadhemiya in north Baghdad.

In Baghdad’s Shiite Sadr City neighborhood, clashes between the Mahdi Army and Iraqi security forces supported by U.S. forces left at least 20 dead and 115 were injured. By early afternoon, people took to the streets in protest of the Iraqi government.

Mortar rounds crashed into the heavily fortified Green Zone for the third straight day, injuring three U.S. government employees, all U.S. citizens, said U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Mirembe Nantongo.

It’s a busy time in the campaign.

The polls remain mostly unchanged from last time–Pollster shows Obama winning North Carolina and Indiana, while Clinton is leading in Pennsylvania.

Meanwhile, it’s been a good few days for Barack Obama.

Today he secured the endorsement of former Presidential candidate Bill Richardson–Richardson is America’s only Hispanic governor, and he boasts an impressive resume which includes Governor of New Mexico, Congressman, UN Ambassador, Clinton administration cabinet member, and many others.   Richardson had this to say about Obama:

You are a once-in-a-lifetime leader…above all, you will be a president who brings this nation together.

[...]

“There is no doubt in my mind that Barack Obama has the judgment and courage we need in a commander in chief when our nation’s security is on the line. he showed this judgment by opposing the Iraq war from the start, and he has shown it during this campaign by standing up for a new era in American leadership internationally.”

This is a big blow to Sen. Clinton, whose husband appointed Richardson to a position in his cabinet.  And in the wake of Richardson’s endorsement, there’s word that Obama is planning a string of high-profile endorsements before the PA primary:

Campaign sources indicate Obama hopes to roll out a series of such endorsements and announcements during the long run-up to the Pennsylvania primary April 22 to create a sense of momentum. There’s still former Sen. John Edwards out there and, of course, former senator, former vice president and former presidential candidate Al Gore, who’s not always had the closest relationship with his ex-boss’s wife.

While Obama has been trying to get past the Wright controversy, Clinton is becoming ensnared in it.  She criticized Obama for associating with Rev. Wright, but will she have to eat her words soon?

The Obama campaign provided a photograph to the New York Times of Bill Clinton greeting the Rev. Jeremiah Wright in an attempt “to divert some attention to the Clintons after a week in which Mr. Obama’s relationship with Mr. Wright has left him facing one of the biggest challenges of his campaign.”

The encounter occurred “during one of the most difficult periods in the presidency of Bill Clinton” when he “addressed a group of clerics at an annual prayer breakfast in September 1998 just as the Starr report outlining his dalliance with Monica Lewinsky was about to be published.”

Meanwhile, the release of Clinton’s records as First Lady are receiving a ton of media scrutiny:

While Clinton’s advertisements have boasted that she is best prepared for a 3 a.m. crisis phone call, the schedules contain no evidence that Clinton was at the table during major national security decisions. They do not list her as attending National Security Council meetings or joining briefings in the Situation Room. She did not have a national security clearance. And the documents make clear that at moments of major crisis, Clinton was often busy with her own agenda.

Expect those records to not only raise questions about her claims of having extensive experience, but to dredge up plenty of old demons from Bill Clinton’s presidency.

Finally, Clinton has been having some fundraising issues:

Clinton’s campaign ended the month with $33.1 million cash on hand. But, that’s deceptive. Clinton has been aggressively raising money for the general election, too. As AP notes, $21.7 million is off limits to the primary campaign. That means her cash on hand is really $11.4 million. In addition, the Clinton campaign reports $8.7 million in debt (including $2.5 million to Mark Penn’s firm) bringing her number down to $2.7 million if she pays the debts. Subtract the $5 million loan she made to herself and we’re talking negative cash balance of -$2.3 million.

On the other hand, Obama had $38.8 million cash on hand at the end of February. Only $7 million is off limits in the primary leaving $31.8 million. The Obama camp had debts of $625,000 and no personal loans to the campaign, meaning he had over $31 million available.

[Emphasis Added]

Thankfully, John McBush’s fundraising has been pretty pathetic, too–$11 million in February, $4.3 million of debt, leaving the Republican nominee with just $5.7 million in the bank.  February was when McBush blew his competitors out of the water and became the presumptive Republican nominee; all of those pocketbooks and wallets that were supposed to open to him right after he became the nominee have remained closed.  Considering the huge advantage the Democratic candidates have had in terms of fundraising, McBush is in major trouble.

Of course, that could be why McBush is moving toward public financing:

Sen. John McCain “has taken a step towards accepting public financing in the general election — a move that would provide an $84 million infusion for his presidential campaign, but also limit its spending and potentially put him at a steep disadvantage to a better-funded Democratic opponent,” according to The Politico.

This month, “he filed papers with the Federal Election Commission creating a separate campaign account that would enable him to make the public money go further.”

McBush knows he can’t come close to raising the money that either Clinton or Obama will in the general election.  And he knows he is already tied into the public financing system–his attempts to weasel out of it prompted a rebuke from the FEC chairman and an FEC complaint filed by the DNC.  So his strategy is going to be to opt into public financing while browbeating the Democratic candidate for not doing the same.

McCain-Feingold was a groundbreaking piece of campaign finance reform law.  Unfortunately, it didn’t go nearly far enough in revamping the public financing system, particularly  in providing more funding for candidates who opt into the system.

In addition, campaign donations are a form of free speech–people express themselves through the candidates they choose to donate to.  Setting such unreasonable limits prevents people from exercising their rights and keeps citizens from developing a stake in the political system.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m in favor of publicly financing all campaigns, but the current system just doesn’t work and candidates shouldn’t be held to it.

It’s going to be a long slog to PA, so steel yourselves for more finger-pointing and dirt-throwing.  Still, the primary is preparing both our candidates to go up against the Right-Wing Noise Machine; the more primary wrangling they endure, the better prepared they will be for all the GOP will throw at them come the fall.

Recently, we learned that several State Department employees improperly accessed the passport files of all three major Presidential candidates.

First, we learned Barack Obama’s file was breached:

Two State Department employees were fired and a third has been disciplined for improperly accessing Sen. Barack Obama’s passport file, the State Department announced last night.

Senior department officials said they learned of the incidents only when a reporter made an inquiry yesterday afternoon. They said an initial investigation indicated that the employees — all of whom worked on contract — were motivated by “imprudent curiosity.”

Bill Burton, spokesman for Obama’s presidential campaign, called the incidents “an outrageous breach of security and privacy.” He said this is “a serious matter that merits a complete investigation,” adding that the campaign will “demand to know who looked at Senator Obama’s passport file, for what purpose, and why it took so long for them to reveal this security breach.”

[...]

[Undersecretary of State Patrick F.] Kennedy said that he did not know yet whether any laws were broken or whether the employees shared the information with others. He said that the incidents, which occurred at three offices, on Jan. 9, Feb. 21 and March 14, should have been “passed up the line” much sooner and that officials were seeking to determine why they had not been disclosed earlier.

Then, we learned that the same thing happened to Sen. Clinton and Sen. McCain:

The passport files of U.S. presidential candidates Sen. Hillary Clinton, a Democrat, and Sen. John McCain, a Republican, were improperly accessed by State Department workers, a U.S. official said Friday.

The official, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter, declined further comment. On Thursday, the State Department said it had fired two employees and disciplined a third for having snooped in the passport files of Sen. Barack Obama, an Illinois Democrat running for president.

What is going on at the State Department? Why are their contractors looking through the confidential passport records of both party’s Presidential candidates? And why wasn’t any of this disclosed sooner? Why weren’t the higher-ups at State–as well as the candidates themselves–informed of these breaches?

And what were the political affiliations of these contractors? The official line is that they were ‘curious,’ but how did State come to that conclusion? And how do they know none of that information has been–or will be–used against any of the candidates?

There has been a shocking lack of oversight at the State Department, which has allowed unauthorized individuals to access sensitive information about Presidential candidates. And the higher-ups at State are so detached they didn’t even find out about those security breaches until months later; once they found out, they failed to inform the aggrieved parties.

This is the kind of government six years of Republican rule gets you–incompetent at best, maliciously harmful at worst. For the love of God, can’t we get some competent adults in charge, for once?

UPDATE: Some information on what’s in someone’s passport file:

A passport record typically consists of applications made by a person for a U.S. passport, together with supporting evidence of U.S. citizenship. The records include details such as date and place of birth, naturalization details, family status, occupation and physical characteristics. Passport records do not include evidence of travel, such as exit and entrance stamps, visas or residence permits.

In other words, it can’t tell you where someone’s been.  But it can tell you vital personal information about someone, and it can also tell you if they lied about or fabricated some aspect of themselves or their political identity.  And that information is far likelier scandal fodder than looking at where someone went and when they came back.

Obama wins Democrats Abroad:

Final results:

Barack Obama 65.6%
Hillary Clinton 32.7%

That’s 11 in a row for Obama (including the Virgin Islands)! There are 7 pledged delegate-equivalents to be awarded, in addition to 4 superdelegate-equivalents. I say “equivalents” because there will actually be 22 delegates sent to Denver, but each will only get a half-vote.

Obama won the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Japan, Thailand, China, Hong Kong, Australia, and Taiwan.

Clinton won Israel, the Dominican Republic and the Phillipines.

After 49 years as Cuba’s iron-fisted dictator, Fidel Castro is relinquishing power at the age of 81:

Fidel Castro announced his resignation as president of Cuba and commander in chief of Cuba’s military Tuesday, according to a letter published in the state-run newspaper, Granma.

[...]

“I will not aspire to, nor will I accept the position of president of the council of state and commander in chief,” Castro wrote. “I wish only to fight as a soldier of ideas. … Perhaps my voice will be heard.”

[...]

He also said he realized that he had a duty to prepare Cubans for his absence.

“My wishes have always been to discharge my duties to my last breath,” he said. “That’s all I can offer.”

Cuba’s leaders plan to elect a president within days. Castro’s brother, Raúl, the country’s defense minister, has been named publicly as his successor.

[...]

Although Raúl Castro has been named as his brother’s successor, the departure of the charismatic leader whose identity became inseparable from his revolution raises questions of how long his system can survive without him.

Raul Castro has signaled that he wants to make some modest economic reforms; his ambitions fall far short of move towards democratization that I (and many others) would like to see in Cuba.

Overall, I don’t expect much to change–Cuba will remain under an iron-fisted dictator who, like Fidel, will improve the people’s lives in some areas while continuing to oppress them in others.

Still, Raul Castro is nearly 77 years old. Within a few years, he too may also be unable to serve as the leader of Cuba. Once the Castros are gone, will Cuba go in a new direction? Will a young reformer step up to the plate and deliver that nation into the 21st century, or will the system Fidel built prove strong enough to endure without him?

Only time will tell. If Fidel taught us anything, though, it’s that isolating our adversaries is bad policy–it led Fidel to dig in his heels for nearly 50 years, engaging in brinksmanship with the United States at every opportunity.

Now, hopefully, the international community will take this opportunity to help Cuba nation modernize and reform, while taking every opportunity to provide assistance to the people of Cuba.

UPDATE: Some reactions:

Barack Obama released a statement on Castro’s resignation:

“Today should mark the end of a dark era in Cuba’s history. Fidel Castro’s stepping down is an essential first step, but it is sadly insufficient in bringing freedom to Cuba.

“Cuba’s future should be determined by the Cuban people and not by an anti-democratic successor regime. The prompt release of all prisoners of conscience wrongly jailed for standing up for the basic freedoms too long denied to the Cuban people would mark an important break with the past. It’s time for these heroes to be released.

“If the Cuban leadership begins opening Cuba to meaningful democratic change, the United States must be prepared to begin taking steps to normalize relations and to ease the embargo of the last five decades. The freedom of the Cuban people is a cause that should bring the Americans together.”

John McCain, R-Ariz., also issued a written reaction to the media.

“Today’s resignation of Fidel Castro is nearly half a century overdue. For decades, Castro oversaw an apparatus of repression that denied liberty to the people who suffered under his dictatorship.

“Yet freedom for the Cuban people is not yet at hand, and the Castro brothers clearly intend to maintain their grip on power. That is why we must press the Cuban regime to release all political prisoners unconditionally, to legalize all political parties, labor unions and free media, and to schedule internationally monitored elections.

“Cuba’s transition to democracy is inevitable; it is a matter of when — not if. With the resignation of Fidel Castro, the Cuban people have an opportunity to move forward and continue pushing for the moment that they will truly be free. America can and should help hasten the sparking of freedom in Cuba. The Cuban people have waited long enough.”

Yesterday, after the Senate voted to ban waterboarding, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino had this to say:

They’ll have to ask themselves, ‘Do you trust the intelligence community more than you trust Democrats who are beholden to their left-wing?‘ And that’s the debate that this country is going to have.

My question to Dana Perino, the Bush White House and the Republican Party is: since when have any of you trusted the intelligence community?

Case in point:

Some Republicans are so unhappy with the NIE that they want a do-over:

Some Republicans in Congress are second-guessing a government intelligence report that Iran has abandoned its nuclear weapons program. They want a second opinion.

The National Intelligence Estimate, released last week, concludes Iran halted its weapons development program in 2003 and that the program remained frozen through at least the middle of this year. That reversed a key finding from a 2005 intelligence report, which said Iran was intently developing a nuclear bomb. An unclassified summary of the new report was released specifically to correct that impression.

The new report was received skeptically by some Republicans on Capitol Hill who believe Iran’s nuclear program remains an immediate threat, and think the 2005 report is closer to the truth.

Republican Sen. John Ensign of Nevada plans to introduce legislation to create a bipartisan commission to produce an alternative report on the same intelligence.

In fact, after the Iran NIE came out–which shamed the right-wing foreign policy establishment by exposing their saber-rattling as political theater–President Bush himself chose to ignore the intelligence community:

But in private conversations with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert last week, the president all but disowned the document, said a senior administration official who accompanied Bush on his six-nation trip to the Mideast. “He told the Israelis that he can’t control what the intelligence community says, but that [the NIE's] conclusions don’t reflect his own views” about Iran’s nuclear-weapons program

[Emphasis Added]

The right wing cherry-picks information from the intelligence community to play up nonexistent threats and score political points; as soon as the intelligence community stands up and debunks their nonsense, the right-wing throws them under the bus.

The GOP doesn’t trust the intelligence community, and will throw them under the bus if they contradict the Republican Party’s talking points.  This makes Dana Perino’s words–like nearly every statement to come out of the Bush White House–ring completely hollow.

This graphic from the House Democratic Caucus shows what just 7 years of Republican governance has done to this country.  It just goes to show you that Republicans can’t govern, a sad but true fact that has been proven time and time again in recent years.

So the next time some GOP politician is asking you for your vote, keep in mind that he might be a future Roadblock Republican; he might be the next George W. Bush; he might be another Tom DeLay; he might take American from boom to bust in a just a few years.

And then make sure to vote for his opponent.

I was watching C-SPAN today when I heard something I couldn’t hep but comment on. During an interview with the chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party, a conservative African-American woman called in and stated “the Democrats have done nothing for me.”

The problem here is that statement is completely wrong–throughout American history, Democrats have done some exceptional things for this country, and we deserve recognition our accomplishments. So, if you’ve benefited from Democratic policies, make sure to thank a Democrat.

If you’re not a wealthy landowner and you vote, thank a Democrat: Andrew Jackson got rid of laws that discriminated against working-class Americans by restricting voting to wealthy landholders.

If you’re a woman and you vote, thank a Democrat: Woodrow Wilson supported the 19^th Amendment, which was passed and ratified during his Presidency.

If you have ever voted while between the ages of 18 and 21, thank a Democrat: Lyndon Johnson and the Democratic Congress passed the 26^th Amendment.

If you never experienced racial segregation, thank a Democrat: Lyndon Johnson and the Democratic Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, which outlawed racial segregation in public schools and public places.

If you never had to take a literacy test or pay a poll tax to vote, thank a Democrat: Lyndon Johnson and the Democratic Congress passed the Voting Rights Act, which outlawed literacy tests as a requirement for voting, as well as the 24^th Amendment, which outlawed poll taxes.

If you earn a fair wage, get paid overtime and/or was never subjected to child labor, thank a Democrat: Franklin Roosevelt and the Democratic Congress passed the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act, which set the first national minimum wage, created requirements for overtime compensation and outlawed child labor.

If you have ever received benefits through Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid, thank a Democrat: Franklin Roosevelt and the Democratic Congress passed the Social Security Act, while Lyndon Johnson and the Democratic Congress passed Medicare and Medicaid.

If you or your child has ever benefited from Head Start or SCHIP, thank a Democrat: Head Start was passed by Lyndon Johnson and the Democratic Congress, while SCHIP was championed by Ted Kennedy and signed into law by Bill Clinton.

If you have ever worked in a clean, safe workplace, thank a Democrat: in 1970, the Democratic Congress passed the Occupational Safety and Health Act, which created national standards for workplace cleanliness and safety.

If you or anyone in your family has taken time off work due to a serious illness, accident, or birth of a child, thank a Democrat: Chris Dodd championed the Family and Medical Leave Act, which required employers to provide paid time off for their employees due to sickness, injury or to care for a newborn child. The Democratic Congress passed FMLA, which was signed into law by Bill Clinton.

If you, your parents or your grandparents were helped by the G.I. Bill, thank a Democrat: the G.I. Bill granted veterans loans to pursue higher education and purchase houses, as well as providing unemployment benefits. It was one of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal initiatives, and it was passed by a Democratic Congress.

If you’re a woman who is paid as much as your male coworkers, thank a Democrat: Lyndon Johnson and the Democratic Congress passed the Equal Pay Act of 1963, guaranteeing equal pay for workers regardless of their gender.

If you’ve never been discriminated against due to your age or physical disability, thank a Democrat: The Age Discrimination in Employment Act was passed by Lyndon Johnson and the Democratic Congress, while the Americans with Disabilities Act was also passed by a Democratic Congress.

If you enjoy clean air and water, thank a Democrat: the Clean Air Act was passed by the Democratic Congress in 1963 and signed into law by Lyndon Johnson; the Clean Water Act was passed by the Democratic Congress in 1977 and signed into law by Jimmy Carter.

If you enjoy freedom and security, thank a Democrat: James Monroe established the Monroe Doctrine, which kept Europe interfering with the free Western Hemisphere. Andrew Jackson fought against the British in the War of 1812, engineering the American victory at New Orleans. James K. Polk rebuffed an invasion from Mexico and acquired the entire American southwest in the Mexican-American War. Franklin Roosevelt mobilized America to defeat fascism, turning the U.S. into a world superpower. Harry Truman created the Marshall Plan–which stopped the spread of Communism in Europe– and he took the initiative in establishing NATO. John Kennedy stood up to the USSR during the Cuban Missile Crisis and in Southeast Asia. Bill Clinton negotiated the historic Oslo Accords between Israel and Palestine, and he helped to both end the violence in Northern Ireland and the genocide in Kosovo.

Of course, this is only the tip of the iceberg. And, of course, this isn’t to say that other political parties haven’t helped people or made this country better. But I doubt there is anyone in this country who can reasonably claim that the Democratic Party has not made their lives better in some way, and I wanted to take some time to point that out.

Happy New Year, everyone! Due to the holiday, posting for the rest of today will be light.

When you’re celebrating tonight, take a moment to remember the 899 American soldiers who were killed in Iraq this past year. For each of them, there is a family whose New Year’s celebration will forever be one person short.

Benazir Bhutto’s son will be the next leader of the Pakistani People’s Party (PPP). From CNN:

Bilawal Zardari, speaking in English at a news conference, said: “I am thankful for the CEC [Central Election Commission] for imposing their trust in me as chairman of the Pakistan People’s Party.”

“Like all chairmen of the PPP, I will stand as the symbol of the federation. The party’s long and historic struggle for democracy will continue with renewed vigor, and I stand committed to the stability of the federation.

“My mother always said democracy is the best revenge.”

Bhutto had named her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, to head the Pakistan People’s Party in her will, which was read on Sunday, but he handed over the position to the couple’s son

[...]

Ali Zardari also said the PPP is asking the United Nations to investigate the circumstances of Bhutto’s December 27 killing. He said he does not plan to call for an autopsy on his wife, who was buried in her hometown on Friday.

[...]

Pakistan’s government has given several explanations for the official cause of Bhutto’s death, most recently saying she died after striking her head on the sunroof of her car. The PPP has called the government’s changing position “a pack of lies.”

“I have lived in this country long enough to know how the autopsies are done,” Ali Zardari said Sunday, explaining why he did not give the home secretary of Punjab province permission for an autopsy.

“It was an insult to my wife, to the sister of the nation, to the mother of the nation, if I was to give her last remains to be post-mortemed and I know the forensics reports are useless.

“We know what the wound is, we know how it was done. We don’t need post-mortems to prove the death, therefore I refuse to give them the last remains, because they belong to God and the people of Pakistan.

It’s hard to tell how this will affect the PPP and Pakistan’s elections. Zardari is only nineteen, currently studying at England’s Oxford University–it’s questionable if he has the experience and the knowledge necessary to run one of Pakistan’s main opposition parties. It will be interesting to see how this turns out.

In regards to Bhutto’s death, new video footage has emerged which appears to show her being shot, which somewhat contradicts the report from Pakistan’t interior ministry saying she died from head trauma incurred during the attack.

There are a number of unanswered questions here, and many of them may never be fully resolved. As it stands now, Pakistan’s future hangs in the balance, and the situation there is rapidly becoming more dangerous–Think Progress brings us this:

In the days since former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated, “nationwide rioting” has “brought life in Pakistan to a standstill.” Yesterday, as “the death toll from the violence climbed above 40,” government officials began “to consider delaying next month’s elections.”

Elections are scheduled for January 8th. Whether or not they occur–and how they turn out–may change the course of Pakistan’s history.

UPDATE: Raw Story brings us this video from the BBC, which claims that Pakistan’s elections will be postponed by two months.

RS also reports on of the devastation in Pakistan’s largest city, Karachi:

The previous three days of clashes and looting left at least 40 people dead across Sindh Province, where Karachi is located, provincial Home Minister Akhtar Zemin told The Associated Press. Hundreds of bank branches were destroyed and 950 vehicles burned.

The normally bustling port city remained a virtual ghost town, shocked by Bhutto’s death. Nearly all shops were closed and streets normally packed with traffic were empty, save for boys playing cricket.

[...]

Police with assault rifles were stationed on street corners across Karachi, and military patrols in armored vehicles rode through the rougher parts of the city, such as the notorious Lyari slums that have seen the most unrest.

Hundreds of Bhutto supporters gathered for memorial prayers at a party office, chanting “Benazir is innocent!” before marching into the streets. They were trailed by a police truck with an officer on top wielding a tear gas grenade launcher.

The PPP and Bhutto’s supporters won’t be going anywhere anytime soon.  Musharraf is going to have to keep his fracturing country together, a sizable task that he might not be able to accomplish.  And now with reports coming out that the elections will be postponed, it’s likely that there will be more violence from Pakistan’s pro-democracy forces.

CNN brings us more on what precisely killed Pakistan’s Benazir Bhutto:

Benazir Bhutto died from a fractured skull caused by hitting her head on part of her car’s sunroof as a bomb ripped through a crowd of her supporters, a spokesman for Pakistan’s Interior Ministry said Friday.

“When she was thrown by the force of the shockwave of the explosion, unfortunately one of the levers of the sunroof hit her,” said spokesman Brigadier Javed Iqbal Cheema.

The explanation is the latest from the Interior Ministry. It initially said Bhutto was killed by shots fired by the bomber, and then, via the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan, it said the cause of death was a shrapnel injury.

[...]

The Interior Ministry also revealed Friday that it had proof showing that al Qaeda was behind Bhutto’s assassination.

Cheema said the government had an intelligence intercept in which an al Qaeda militant “congratulated his people for carrying out this cowardly act.”

However, that claim has not appeared on radical Islamist Web sites that regularly post such messages from al Qaeda and other militant groups.

The Interior Ministry told Pakistan’s GEO-TV that the suicide bomber belonged to Lashkar-e-Jhangvi — an al Qaeda-linked Sunni Muslim militant group that the government has blamed for hundreds of killings.

U.S. officials believe that a Taliban leader from Afghanistan, Baitullah Mahsud, may be the person behind the assassination.

Unfortunately, these revelations have to be taken with a grain of salt–these are spokespeople from Pervez Musharraf’s government, and there is a chance that elements in the government may have played a role in this. Thus, they may have an interest in misrepresenting the cause of death or pinning the assassination on someone else. Of course, it should be noted that there is also no evidence showing anyone in the government had a hand in the assassination, though many are pointing to governmental negligence as a contributing factor.

Pervez Musharraf’s government has very little credibility left, and it will be difficult for people to believe in an investigation conducted by the government. There must be some sort of investigation into Bhutto’s assassination that has a degree of independence from Pakistan’s government, in the event that individuals or groups within the government were in some way to blame for it.

Along those lines, the Pakistani government has ordered an official judicial inquiry into Bhutto’s death, which will incorporate representatives from her political party. Talking Points Memo has more:

Caretaker Prime Minister Mohammedmian Soomro told journalists following an emergency cabinet meeting that a judge would be appointed to head a committee to probe the gun-suicide bomb attack on Bhutto Thursday afternoon as she left an election campaign rally in the city of Rawalpindi.

The committee chairperson would be appointed in consultation with officials from Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), and a report would be submitted within a time frame to be determined later, he said.

Soomro said the cabinet was considering postponing elections scheduled for January 8 because of Bhutto’s murder, but would not act until after consulting with the country’s main opposition parties.

“Right now the elections stand as they are,” he said. “I am ready to meet the opposition leaders on one minute’s notice, and we are even in contact with some of them.”

It’s hopeful that the investigation into the assassination will involve Pakistan’s opposition parties, and that the elections have not been postponed yet. If Musharraf’s government interferes with either the investigation or the scheduled election, it’s likely that Pakistan will dissolve into even more violence.

Pakistan is on the verge of a power vacuum; Musharraf is hemorrhaging support and there is no longer a significant opposition figure to step forward and take control of the flagging government. This instability, combined with Pakistan’s extremist groups and nuclear arsenal, makes this a particularly difficult situation.

More as it develops…

UPDATE: Wonkette brings us a series of photographs from before and after the assassination. Before viewing, keep in mind that these photos contain significant violence and gore.

On the domestic front, Mike Huckabee uses the Bhutto assassination to show off his woeful lack of knowledge on foreign policy:

“People who questioned my view of foreign policy probably need go back and read the speech that i delivered back in Washington in September. … We have seen what happens in the Musharraf government. He has told us he does not have enough control of those eastern borders near Afghanistan to be able go after the terrorists. But on the other hand, did he not want us going in so what do we do?”

Pakistan’s western border is with Afghanistan–their eastern border is with India.

UPDATE II: Confusions remains over the exact cause of Bhutto’s death:

Bhutto’s political party disputed official versions of the incident, accusing the government of lying. Video footage of Thursday’s attack on Bhutto contains a murky shot of a hand firing a pistol three times, but the Pakistani government said Bhutto — who was standing through her vehicle’s sunroof — was not hit.

The latest explanation Friday by Pakistan’s Interior Ministry said Bhutto, 54, died from a fractured skull after hitting her head on a piece of the vehicle.

[...]

On Thursday, an initial report from the Interior Ministry said Bhutto died of a gunshot wound to the neck.

[...]

Dr. Mussadiq Khan of Rawalpindi General Hospital, who treated Bhutto before she was declared dead, said she had “a big wound” on the side of her head “that usually occurs when something big, with a lot of speed, hits that area.”

[...]

Farzana Raja of Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party said the government’s explanation is “a pack of lies,” and she offered another explanation. “It was a sniper shooting,” she said, also accusing the government of a “total security lapse.”

CNN national security analyst Ken Robinson, who worked in U.S. intelligence in Pakistan during the Clinton administration, said he suspects Bhutto’s enemies are attempting to control her legacy by minimizing the attack’s role in her demise.

“They’re trying to deny her a martyr’s death, and in Islam, that’s pretty important,” Robinson said.

Bhutto’s supporters may benefit from the assassination, if she becomes a martyr for their causes. The latest government report on the assassination minimizes the effect of the attack, stating that she hit her head and subsequently expired.  Whether the government is telling the truth or not is up in the air–maybe they played a role in the assassination, or maybe they’re using this opportunity to downplay her death, or maybe they’re actually telling the truth. At this point, nobody knows for sure.
It’s likely that the tension between the opposition party and the government will continue, which is why an independent investigation is necessary.  Even if one is completed, though, there’s a likelihood that (depending on the findings) it might end up being disputed still.

In addition, The Huffington Post brings us photos of Bhutto’s vehicle, as well as her head X-rays from after the attack.  As with the pictures above, these are also graphic.

From CNN:

Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Thursday after addressing a large gathering of her supporters.

The suicide bomb attack also killed at least 22 others, doctors said. It was not immediately clear if Bhutto died from shots fired before the blast, or from wounds caused by bomb shrapnel.

President Pervez Musharraf held an emergency meeting in the hours after the death, according to state media.

He said the killers were the same extremists that Pakistan is fighting a war against, and announced three days of national mourning.

Video of the scene just moments before the explosion showed Bhutto stepping into a heavily guarded vehicle to leave the rally.

Police sources told CNN the bomber, who was riding a motorcycle, blew himself up near Bhutto’s vehicle

[...]

The attack came just hours after four supporters of former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif died when members of another political party opened fire on them at a rally near the Islamabad airport Thursday, Pakistan police said.

Several other members of Sharif’s party were wounded, police said.

First off, there should be no rush to judgment–we don’t know who planned this or why. It could have been supporters of President Pervez Musharraf hoping to keep him in office; it could have been supporters of Bhutto hoping to use her death to take down the Musharraf regime; it could have been any number of other groups pushing some kind of political agenda, or it could have just been one person with a political axe to grind. As it stands now, nobody knows who did this or why.

In addition, it should be noted that Bhutto has a number of enemies in Pakistan. Though the media portrayed her as the country’s pro-democracy savior, she was partially responsible for Musharraf’s rise in the first place–she was so dogged by charges of corruption and nepotism as Prime Minister that her government was dismissed twice, once in 1993 and again in 1996.

Alex Rossmiller at AMERICAblog has some thoughts on this:

In terms of policy implications, this is reflective of a massive US foreign policy blunder, in that the Bush administration, in a monumentally stupid move, shoved Bhutto down the throat of Musharraf (and the rest of Pakistan) as a savior, despite her lack of broad popular support and general reputation as corrupt. In making someone who didn’t necessarily have the ability to deliver the savior for democracy in Pakistan, we simultaneously set up our own policy to fail and offered Musharraf a return to (or continued) total power in the event that our little power-sharing arrangement didn’t work. We also — though not only us — painted a big fat target on her back. Really a debacle all the way around.

Along these lines, there have been calls for Musharraf to step down–either because he’s responsible for the attack or because he was negligent in going after extremists and providing Bhutto protection. Bill Richardson has released a statement along those lines, and longtime Bhutto advisor Husain Haqqani has also said as much:

“There is only one possibility: the security establishment and Musharraf are complicit, either by negligence or design. That is the most important thing. She’s not the first political leader killed, since Musharraf took power, by the security forces.”

I’m inclined to agree somewhat–Pakistan is home to a wide array of extremist groups, including the remnants of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda–Musharraf has done little to combat them, allowing those groups to flourish under his rule. As the July 2007 NIE [PDF] concluded:

Al-Qa’ida is and will remain the most serious terrorist threat to the Homeland, as its central leadership continues to plan high-impact plots, while pushing others in extremist Sunni communities to mimic its efforts and to supplement its capabilities. We assess the group has protected or regenerated key elements of its Homeland attack capability, including: a safehaven in the Pakistan Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), operational lieutenants, and its top leadership.

Bhutto’s assassination is a tragedy, there’s no doubt. And it’s likely that–no matter who is responsible–Musharraf may use this to his political advantage.

Even if he and his people aren’t responsible, his poor leadership in going after extremism has allowed violence like this to happen. No matter what, Musharraf carries some of the blame for this, and he should bear some responsibility.

Should he step down? Certainly not now, when Pakistan is mired in domestic turmoil, but there should be some accounting for his multiple failures over the years.

More as this develops…

UPDATE: John Cole provides some perspective:

Pakistan is important to US security. It is a nuclear power. Its military fostered, then partially turned on the Taliban and al-Qaeda, which have bases in the lawless tribal areas of the northern part of the country. And Pakistan is key to the future of its neighbor, Afghanistan. Pakistan is also a key transit route for any energy pipelines built between Iran or Central Asia and India, and so central to the energy security of the United States.

[...]

The NYT reported that US Secretary of State Condi Rice tried to fix Musharraf’s subsequent dwindling legitimacy by arranging for Benazir to return to Pakistan to run for prime minister, with Musharraf agreeing to resign from the military and become a civilian president. When the supreme court seemed likely to interfere with his remaining president, he arrested the justices, dismissed them, and replaced them with more pliant jurists. This move threatened to scuttle the Rice Plan, since Benazir now faced the prospect of serving a dictator as his grand vizier, rather than being a proper prime minister.

With Benazir’s assassination, the Rice Plan is in tatters and Bush administration policy toward Pakistan and Afghanistan is tottering.

CNN has more:

But it was not immediately clear, however, what if any influence Washington might have or whether Bhutto’s death would drive the United States into a deeper embrace of Musharraf, whom some believe offers the best chance for Pakistani stability despite his democratic shortcomings.

“This latest tragedy is likely to reinforce beliefs that Pakistan is a dangerous, messy place and potentially very unstable and fragile and that they need to cling to Musharraf even more than they did in the past,” said Daniel Markey, who left the State Department this year and is now a senior fellow at the private Council on Foreign Relations.

“The weight of the administration is still convinced that Musharraf is a helpful rather than a harmful figure,” he said.

[...]

“The United States does not have a great deal of leverage where Pakistan is concerned,” said Wendy Sherman, who served as counselor to former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. “And at the end of the day, the decisions are going to be made by the Pakistani people and by the leadership of Pakistan and not by the United States.”

Other analysts warned that Bhutto’s assassination might further damage Musharraf, whose democratic credentials have been seriously tarnished by growing authoritarianism, and have lead to widespread unrest.

“Legitimacy for Musharraf will be deferred if not impossible,” said Christine Fair, a South Asia expert at the RAND Corporation. “The U.S. likely does not have a plan for this contingency as Musharraf remains a critical ally and because Bhutto’s participation was hoped to confer legitimacy to the upcoming January elections.”

Pakistan’s future is in turmoil. Musharraf has been hemorrhaging support in recent years, particularly in response to his consolidation of power. He could attempt to use the assassination (and the resulting turmoil) to solidify his power and quell political dissent, but it’s likely that any attempt to do so would simply inflame the opposition, leading to even more violence. And why wouldn’t they react with violence? With Bhutto–their best chance to crack Musharraf’s iron-fisted rule–gone, what do they have to lose now?

Even if Musharraf doesn’t take advantage of the situation, the opposition will. In fact, they’re already blaming him for the assassination. Whether they accuse him of having a hand in it or simply being negligent in fighting extremism, they’ll hold him responsible and call for him to resign. It’s likely that the assassination will erode Musharraf’s support even more, and it could even be the spark that takes down his regime. Of course, whether that is a good thing or a bad thing depends on who would take power afterwards.

It’s hard to tell where things will go from here, but it’s clear that things will get worse before they get better. The biggest loser here is the Pakistani people, who face increased violence and instability in their country. A close second is Bush administration, who pinned their plan to democratize Pakistan on Bhutto’s victory. She was our leverage against the Musharraf regime–without her threatening his power, the U.S. has lost a lot of leverage in pushing for democratic reforms.

UPDATE II: According to Adnkronos International, Al-Qaeda is claiming responsibility for the attack:

A spokesperson for the al-Qaeda terrorist network has claimed responsibility for the death on Thursday of former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto.

“We terminated the most precious American asset which vowed to defeat [the] mujahadeen,” Al-Qaeda’s commander and main spokesperson Mustafa Abu Al-Yazid told Adnkronos International (AKI) in a phone call from an unknown location, speaking in faltering English. Al-Yazid is the main al-Qaeda commander in Afghanistan.

It is believed that the decision to kill Bhutto, who is the leader of the opposition Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), was made by al-Qaeda No. 2, the Egyptian doctor, Ayman al-Zawahiri in October.

Death squads were allegedly constituted for the mission and ultimately one cell comprising a defunct Lashkar-i-Jhangvi’s Punjabi volunteer succeeded in killing Bhutto.

UPDATE III: Turning to the domestic implications of the Bhutto assassination, Matt Yglesias has this to say:

Well, it seems to me that we desperately need to break away from the “trouble abroad, let’s turn to hawkier hawks!” mode of organizing our politics. After all, there was a strategic choice undertaken by the United States of America during the year 2002 to refocus our attention away from Central Asia and the Pakistan/Afghanistan area and toward the Persian Gulf. That was, of course, the “tough,” “strong,” “serious” thing to do.

Then throughout 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007 it’s been the case that the “tough,” “strong,” “serious” thing to do is to maintain a massive strategic focus on Iraq in particular and the Persian Gulf in general. Vast quantities of troops, money, and attention lavished on the Gulf was Central Asia languishes.

[Emphasis Added]

Whenever there’s violence or political turmoil abroad, our polity–particularly the political press–embraces right-wing hawkey as a solution.

Why, though? Here in the U.S., right-wing hawks made both America and the world less safe–they invested huge amounts of time, effort and money into Iraq, which has devolved into an unstable, violent civil war. Iran has become more poweful due to the fact that they no longer have Iraq to keep them in check. North Korea behan building and testing nuclear weapons, which ended only when hawkishness was abandoned and negotiation was embraced.  In addition, the hawks took America’s focus off of Al-Qaeda–which has been re-establishing itself in Pakistan and took credit for the Bhutto assassination–and instead put it all on Iraq.

Clearly, hawkishness has contributed to global instability and violence.  In light of recent history,  perhaps our political press should re-evaluate the way it perceives–and portrays–events such as this.  Hopefully we can put the “trouble abroad, let’s turn to hawkier hawks!” electoral philosophy to rest once and for all.

Here are some bite-sized bits of news from around the web:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced that he will prevent President Bush from making controversial recess appointments over the winter holiday. Good for him–Bush brought this on himself by nominating outside-the-mainstream right-wing radicals to crucial government posts. The fact that Bush has to shoehorn these guys into office through recess appointments because they’d never get confirmed is disqualifying in and of itself. Give ‘em hell, Harry!

From the Department of Tell Me Something I Don’t Know: Mitch McConnell doesn’t have any faith that he’ll become Majority leader come January, 2009:

“There’s no question that if you just look at the numbers, we have a daunting task,” McConnell said at a Wednesday news conference on the eve of the year-end congressional adjournment. “I think the chances of you all calling me the majority leader a year from now are rather slim because of the number situation.”

When the Republican leader in the Senate says the GOP is in trouble, then the GOP is in trouble–remember, these guys can never admit when they make mistakes. Now, you would think knowing that a bunch of Republican Senators are going to get fired soon would lead the GOP to abandon their hyperpartisanship and obstructionism, but I guess not. Maybe they’ll learn after their defeat…

Meanwhile, Republican Presidential longshot Ron Paul is keeping a campaign contribution from a white supremacist leader, claiming

“Dr. Paul stands for freedom, peace, prosperity and inalienable rights. If someone with small ideologies happens to contribute money to Ron, thinking he can influence Ron in any way, he’s wasted his money,” Paul spokesman Jesse Benton said. “Ron is going to take the money and try to spread the message of freedom.”

Hey, guys? Usually campaigns donate tainted money to charity–Megan Carpenter suggests the NAACP<