There is a potentially eery, disconcerting passage in Dexter Filkins’ interesting report on the Afghan, British and American push into the Taliban stronghold of Marja in Helmand Province. Filkins notes that the opposition didn’t really materialize, despite reports that they had recently received reinforcements.
John Podesta on Obama team. I am hearing that Financial Times Washington Bureau Chief Edward Luce has a pretty significant interview with Center for American Progress President and former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta coming out on Monday. Luce recently did a video interview with Senator John McCain.
Several years ago, I met with the Deputy Director of the Policy Planning staff of China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and I asked him what he was working on — and what China’s grand strategy was. His reply: “We are trying to figure out how to keep you Americans distracted in small Middle Eastern countries.
(Photo: United Nations Development Programme’s Photostream) This is a guest note by Johanna Mendelson Forman. She is a senior associate of the Americas Program and the William E. Simon Chair in Political Economy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart (R-FL-21) has announced that he will not seek reelection in November. There is speculation that his brother, Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL-25), will shift districts and run for Lincoln’s vacated seat because it is more Republican dominant.
Bill Clinton has been hospitalized, according to a blitz of news alerts moments ago. We hope that he will be OK and recover quickly. The world and America are not done with him, not to mention all of his current responsibilities in helping to generate massive aid for Haiti.
Yemen’s government has just released a statement that it has reached a truce with the Houthi tribes in Northwest Yemen.
(photo credit: Brian McKeon) Senate staff member Brian McKeon snapped this great shot of sledding at the US Capitol during the great blizzard of 2010. And for those trying to be irritated at a government that is shut down, these sledding pics were taken Saturday. . .just to clarify.
I really like Tommy Sowers — and while I normally don’t post appeals to support this Congressman or that, I couldn’t help it in this case. Sowers, a former Special Forces officer who did deployments in Kosovo and Iraq, was also a new media and politics instructor at West Point.
I recently had the opportunity to participate in a small dinner with CENTCOM Commander General David Petraeus and his wife Holly. These sorts of discussions are nearly always off the record — but the fact that they happened is not off limits.
