By Steve Clemons

This picture of Philadelphia business man Richard Vague and former National Security Advisor General Brent Scowcroft was taken today on the Acela AMTRAK train up to New York.

The absence of results-producing American leadership in the Israel-Palestine mess has led both the Israelis and Palestinians, as well as stakeholders around the Middle East and world, to doubt the seriousness of the US effort.

I have known Fred Hiatt for years — not closely but in a professional and friendly sense; we have both been deeply dipped in Japan stuff.

Last August, President Obama’s national security advisers, including Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Attorney General Eric Holder and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, met in the White House situation room to decide whether and how to go forward with trials for some Guantanamo prisoners.

I’m sure if I was born into an African-American family in 1962 in Salina, Kansas — where I was actually born, my personal sense of civil rights advancements would feel very different than I feel looking at the question through a gay portal.

Since posting the letter that a variety of policy practitioners and commentators, former US government officials and academics sent to President Obama asking his support of a UN resolution that is consistent with his administration’s stated views on the illegality of Israeli settlements in Occupied Territory, others have signed on. The full list is here….

JOIN THE LIVE CHAT VISIT WHITEHOUSE.GOV This has to be one of the coolest things I have seen at the White House — and I’m watching it live right now from my breakfast table at the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs.

(thanks to LIFE.com for permission to reprint this picture; click image for larger version) I am really enjoying LIFE.com‘s more frequent releases of never before published nor seen photos of great events and people, and I’m grateful for the permissions from LIFE to share these photos with readers of The Washington Note.

A letter from an array of concerned policy commentators and practitioners, academics, and former government officials about the resolution pending at the United Nations Security Council on illegal Israeli settlements in Occupied Territory has just been released and is posted below.

— Steve Clemons