By Steve Clemons

Last night, I sat next to a former foreign minister of a major nation at a small dinner and discussion which focused heavily on Iran and Middle East issues.

I like Tim Roemer, the former Congressman from Indiana who now is President of the Center for National Policy as well as his staff — but I have to give him some push back on his New York Times op-ed this morning.

Oil barons are inappropriately lining their coffers with mountains of dollars from American citizens by generating oligopolistic cartel conditions on the price of refined oil and gasoline. Yesterday, Exxon posted a first-quarter profit of $8.4 billion and is on track to outpace the most profitable year in its history.

(CIA Director Goss Swearing Oath We Think He Has Forgotten) Dear CIA Director Goss: You were once a member of the U.S. Congress. You represented constituents and swore an oath to defend and protect our system of government, our Constitution.

Karl Rove is back before the Valerie Plame case grand jury this morning — being reported everywhere. What would a Rove indictment be worth in terms of Bush approval rating points — now at 32%.

ABC News is reporting that the Pentagon hopes to pull 30,000 troops out of Iraq if conditions are right on the ground. The condition that most matters most to the White House and our President, “the decider,” is the proximity to election day on November 7, 2006.

(European Parliament Member Cem Oezdemir) Cem Oezdemir, a former German Bundestag Member and now a Member of the European Parliament, will be coming to Washington soon to press the matter of the CIA’s kidnappings, rendition program, and secret prisons in Europe — which may still be operating there.

Natan Sharansky must be sad that April has rolled along and Dubya has not invited him over to the Oval Office for lunch and a chat. So, Sharansky has written as obseqious a letter to the President as one can imagine via the Wall Street Journal.

(Joseph Cirincione) Wow. I’ve just confirmed that nuclear non-proliferation giant Joseph Cirincione is moving out of his long-time nest at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and is moving to the Center for American Progress. Cirincione is easily the country’s leading progressive voice on nuclear non-proliferation and is widely respected on defense policy issues.

Senior CIA official Mary McCarthy has denied leaking information to Dana Priest about the CIA’s secret Eastern European prisons. She has argued that she did not have access to intelligence about these prisons, though seems to be admitting to unauthorized discussions with journalists. A couple of comments.