Category: General

Tony Blair has informed his Queen and his Cabinet that he is stepping down as Prime Minister. Americans tend to look at other country’s heads-of-state through the prism of their own president — but Blair even more so. Blair used to seem a lot like Clinton. Now sadly, he looks a lot like Bush.

Rep. Tom Allen kicked off his campaign to oust Maine Republican Susan Collins from the Senate by declaring the invasion of Iraq “the worst foreign policy mistake in our nation’s history.” Allen is generally on the right track.

Ambassador Khalilzad’s first speech before the U.N. General Assembly is pasted below the fold. Bush administration policy hasn’t substantially changed over the past five months, but, with the switch from John Bolton, the tone has. And at the United Nations, tone matters.

In international finance circles, Michael Mussa is a legendary figure who used to work at the thin air levels at the International Monetary Fund.

Barack Obama‘s policy shop is kicking out some good stuff. I find this proposal reported by Bloomberg of his to help American automobile manufacturers offset retiree health care costs for gains in cutting carbon emissions intriguing.

One of the unwritten but hard as concrete rules in the governance of the world’s two most important transnational financial institutions is that a European heads the International Monetary Fund and an American heads the World Bank. . .always.

Kevin Kellems, who previously worked as spokesman for Vice President Cheney and then became a senior adviser to Paul Wolfowitz at the World Bank, has announced he is resigning his position. He is the first to fall in Wolfowitz’s camp after the turmoil triggered by allegations of nepotism and mismanagement by Wolfowitz at the Bank….

Worldwatch researcher Michael Renner’s chapter in the 2005 edition of State of the World is probably the best summary of the intersection between environment and security out there. He also co-authored a great chapter on disaster management as a peacebuilding opportunity with my good friend Zoe Chafe in last year’s State of the World.

I agree with Scott Paul that John Bolton’s co-mingling during his Bradley Prize acceptance speech of Senator Chris Dodd and and former Senator Lincoln Chafee with prominent citizens of Pyongyang, Havana, Damascus and Tehran was at first glance disconcerting.