Sarkozy to Celebrate Lafayette's 250th Birthday at Mount Vernon

Apparently M. le President is as big a Lafayette fan as Yours Truly,AFP reports:

WASHINGTON (AFP) — US President George W. Bush rolls out the red carpet next week for French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, eager for their views on Iran's nuclear program and Russia.

The high-stakes week of diplomacy, which will also see Bush host Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, comes as Washington seeks more sanctions against Tehran and worries about the health of democratic reforms in Moscow.

Bush will host his French counterpart at the White House on Tuesday for an official dinner, then squire him on Wednesday to the Mount Vernon estate of the first US president, George Washington.

The two leaders were expected to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the birth of the Marquis de Lafayette, the French soldier and diplomat who played a key role in the American revolution.

I wish they were visiting the homes of Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe, as well, both friends of the French Enlightenment--fittingly, Monroe's townhouse serves today as the Arts Club of Washington. Of course, Lafayette lived at Mount Vernon, and there is a key to the Bastille in a glass case there, presented by the Marquis who liberated the prison...

James Kurth: Return Pakistan to India

From The American Interest:

While there were particular ethnic communities that served as loyal allies of imperial powers in imposing order upon disorderly cities and turbulent frontiers, there were also particular ethnic communities that always seemed to be in opposition to the imperial order, or, indeed, to any order other than their own peculiar one. The British called these “unruly peoples.” The most notorious of these unruly peoples—indeed, the British called them “ungovernable”—were the Pashtuns (then called the Pathans), who inhabited both the southern and eastern parts of Afghanistan and the Northwest Frontier Province of British India. And so the Pashtuns have remained, right down to the present day. We might now call them a rogue people.

They have been a rogue people at great cost to the rest of the world. The Pashtuns are virtually the only ethnic community in Afghanistan that supports the Taliban, and indeed virtually everyone in the Taliban is a Pashtun. It was, of course, the Taliban regime and therefore the Pashtun community that hosted and protected al-Qaeda before the American invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, and it is the Pashtun community in the Northwest Frontier Province and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan that hosts and protects al-Qaeda there today.

Like many close-knit ethnic or tribal communities, the Pashtuns have an intense sense of communal identity and almost no sense of an individual one. They also naturally have an intense sense of their enemies’ communal identities, including their collective guilt. It is impossible to deal with the Pashtuns as individuals, responding to calculations of individual benefits and costs. This is why, after more than five years, no one has stepped forward to turn in Osama bin Laden or Mullah Mohammed Omar (the leader of the Taliban), even though the United States has offered a $25 million reward for each. The only way to deal with the Pashtuns is the way they deal with themselves and with everyone else, as a community that is capable of both collective honor and guilt...

...With its vast Muslim population of 130 million, India has had ample and generally successful experience with the problem of maintaining law and order invoving an internal Muslim community. In its ongoing Islamist insurgency in Kashmir, India has also had ample and often painful experience with this problem—a sort of Indian “near abroad.” India certainly is a willing ally in a grand coalition against Islamist terrorists, so long as we do not insist on formally calling them an ally.

India’s biggest contribution could issue from any future disintegration of Pakistan. This state has always been an artificial and brittle one, and in many areas—most obviously, in the Northwest Frontier Province, the autonomous tribal areas, and, increasingly, in Baluchistan, as well—it is a failing one. With a strong Islamist presence in the country and even in the military, Pakistan could one day become an Islamist state already possessing nuclear weapons. An Islamist Pakistan, perhaps with al-Qaeda operating on its territory, would probably be the most dangerous state in the world, a rogue state in the fullest sense of the term.

If the United States should ever determine that this state had to be put to an end, India would be the best ally to help do it—to “crack the Paks”, as it were. The ruins of this artificial country would produce four or five separate ethnic provinces, each of which could be reconstructed and ordered by a new Indian Raj with a mixture of direct and indirect rule—in a way not unlike the British Raj that once ruled these very same provinces.

Fred Kaplan on Condoleeza Rice

News from Pakistan makes this article from Sunday's Washington Post Outlook section seem particularly timely:

Finally, there looms Iraq, where the only recent tactical successes have involved building up tribal warlords, not creating a beacon of democracy. This war has been Rice's war as much as anybody's in the administration. Long after her celebrity and charm have been forgotten, her epitaph will endure: She pursued democracy at the expense of stability, and achieved neither.

Kyrgystan's Clash of Civilizations

From Channel Four News (UK), this report on Islamist extremism in Kyrgyzstan. One of the producers, Alisher Saipov, was murdered in broad daylight in the town of Osh, after working on the segment.

Three Godfathers

Last night, someone I know and I watched John Wayne, John Wayne,Pedro Armendáriz, Harry Carey Jr., Ward Bond, and the John Ford stock company in 3 Godfathers. This 1948 spectacular is a real John Ford Western, combining a mythic plot (the Christmas Story); spectacular Western scenery, racial issues (Mexican v. Cowboy), the Law, and interestingly, John Wayne as a bank-robber leading a band of desperadoes. Ward Bond plays Sheriff Purlie Sweet, chasing him across the desert. Sort of like The Searchers, but with John Wayne as "Scar".

I saw a lot of John Ford movies at film school, but I never saw this one--and I don't know why. John Wayne plays a Bad Guy, albeit a "good Bad Guy." At times the film is almost surrealistic, when Wayne imagines his dead partners in crime come back to life. The ambiguity about good and bad, as well as the "happy ending" where Wayne seems to win the heart of the girl whose father's bank he robbed, seem to foreshadow the anti-heroes of the 1950s.

The plot is simple. Three bank robbers come across a dying woman in the desert. They promise to raise her baby. And then, they must make it back to civilization, rather than escape the law by slipping over the Mexican border. The classic Duty v. Desire conflict. One by one, the godfathers perish in the hot sand. Finally making it to town, John Wayne collapses after placing the baby on the bar of the saloon in "New Jerusalem." He doesn't die. Instead, he's reborn as an "honest man." Although the plot is different, the situation, as someone I know suggested, certainly looks like it may have inspired Three Men and a Baby. After all, John Ford is very popular in France...

Add it to your Netflix queue. Five Stars.

US Government Prosecuted Water Torture After WWII

Evan Wallach writes in today's Washington Post Outlook section:

The United States knows quite a bit about waterboarding. The U.S. government -- whether acting alone before domestic courts, commissions and courts-martial or as part of the world community -- has not only condemned the use of water torture but has severely punished those who applied it.

After World War II, we convicted several Japanese soldiers for waterboarding American and Allied prisoners of war. At the trial of his captors, then-Lt. Chase J. Nielsen, one of the 1942 Army Air Forces officers who flew in the Doolittle Raid and was captured by the Japanese, testified: "I was given several types of torture. . . . I was given what they call the water cure." He was asked what he felt when the Japanese soldiers poured the water. "Well, I felt more or less like I was drowning," he replied, "just gasping between life and death."

Nielsen's experience was not unique. Nor was the prosecution of his captors. After Japan surrendered, the United States organized and participated in the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, generally called the Tokyo War Crimes Trials. Leading members of Japan's military and government elite were charged, among their many other crimes, with torturing Allied military personnel and civilians. The principal proof upon which their torture convictions were based was conduct that we would now call waterboarding.

And not just against the Japanese.

In 1983, federal prosecutors charged a Texas sheriff and three of his deputies with violating prisoners' civil rights by forcing confessions. The complaint alleged that the officers conspired to "subject prisoners to a suffocating water torture ordeal in order to coerce confessions. This generally included the placement of a towel over the nose and mouth of the prisoner and the pouring of water in the towel until the prisoner began to move, jerk, or otherwise indicate that he was suffocating and/or drowning."

The four defendants were convicted, and the sheriff was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

We know that U.S. military tribunals and U.S. judges have examined certain types of water-based interrogation and found that they constituted torture. That's a lesson worth learning. The study of law is, after all, largely the study of history. The law of war is no different. This history should be of value to those who seek to understand what the law is -- as well as what it ought to be.

Nikolaj Znaider Conquers Washington

At least, the concert-goers at the Kennedy Center's all-Beethoven program by the National Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Hungarian maestro Ivan Fisher last night. Znaider, an Israeli-Polish virtuoso from Denmark, played Beethoven's Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 61 just brilliantly. He seemed to have a special relationship with concertmaster Nurit Bar-Josef, lots of meaningful glances that might have been some musical shorthand--but that looked an awful lot like flirting. He's taller by a head than maestro Fisher, himself a dynamic Hungarian, whose exhalations from exertion could be heard over the score, at least in our second-row seats. The house was almost full, Znaider got a standing ovation, and among the local celebrities in attendance was NPR Supreme Court diva Nina Totenberg. The rest of the program was grand, as well--Egmont and Coriolan overtures, followed by the reliably crowd-pleasing Symphony Number Five in C Minor, Op.67.

Da-da-da--dum!

Here's a link to a profile of Znaider in Strings Magazine.

Pakistan Declares Martial Law

According to Reuters.

Gary H. Johnson Reviews The Al Qaeda Reader

From The American Thinker:

In full, Raymond Ibrahim's text The Al Qaeda Reader provides the world of English-speakers many lessons that we may choose to learn or dismiss. Chief among these lessons is that in Islam there is no separation between Mosque and State. For years, since the fall of the Twin Towers, moderate Muslims have claimed their religion had been hijacked by fundamentalists, literalists, radicals, and extremists; and, now the West has been apprised of the twisted view of two of these hijackers.

Is this message of hate the literalist perspective of Islam laid bare for the world to see? And if it is, what does it teach the World of English-speakers about the Koran's content, intent, and merit? The fact is, all Muslims believe the Koran to be the literal, uncorrupted word of Allah, written in the celestial language of Arabic. Moving past the arrogance necessary to declare to the world that any language is that of God, what does this text teach us about the original words of the Islamic God? Has the God of Islam, Allah, demanded His followers to wage jihad on all infidels in a quest to force the entire planet to convert, pay alms, or die? And if the Koran is the literal, uncorrupted, Word and Warning of Allah; then, why would we, infidels, ever consider "Peaceful" a religion which promises our demise as sovereign states in one form or another, following obligatory genocidal purges, inquisitions, enslavements, indoctrination, trials of apostasy, and the death of the very idea of American Freedom, and the death of every value held as heroic in the West? For the West's concepts of equality, justice and freedom do not hold parallel with the Koran's or Sharia's view of the same.

In full, Raymond Ibrahim's release The Al Qaeda Reader is a necessary addition to the scholarship of jihad. The text begs the question: does the doctrine proclaimed by al Qaeda's leadership, now widely known among the world's Muslims, guarantee a state of perpetual war against the whole of humanity? And if so, what is the process of eradication of these elements from the Ulema consensus in order to defuse this ticking bomb of world-wide genocide?

You can buy the book from Amazon.com, here.

Protests Sweep Georgian Capital

From the BBC:

Thousands of protesters are on the streets of Georgia for a second day to demand the resignation of President Mikhail Saakashvili. Many of the protesters had camped overnight outside the parliament building in the capital, Tbilisi.

The crowd has swelled during the day, but has not yet matched the 50,000-strong crowd seen on Friday.

The protesters want an early election, accusing the president of leading a corrupt, authoritarian government.

The pro-Western Mr Saakashvili came to power in January 2004 following the peaceful "Rose revolution", which toppled President Eduard Shevardnadze.

The country is still struggling to recover from years of post-Soviet economic decay, instability and civil war."

Russian TV coverage, here via YouTube.

President Theodore Roosevelt Banned Water Torture 100 Years Ago

From Daniel A. Rezneck's article, "Roosevelt was right: Waterboarding wrong," on Politico.com:

But waterboarding was also a prime subject of controversy in Congress and in the U.S. more than 100 years ago.

The occasion was the Philippine insurrection, which began soon after the American victory in the Spanish-American War of 1898. It soon became clear that the American liberation of the Philippines from Spanish rule did not mean freedom for the Filipinos but annexation by the United States.

The Filipinos fought back savagely against the American occupation, committing many atrocities.

American soldiers responded with what was called the “water cure” or “Chinese water torture.” As described in a 1902 congressional hearing: “A man is thrown down on his back and three or four men sit on his arms and legs and hold him down, and either a gun barrel or a rifle barrel or a carbine barrel or a stick as big as a belaying pin ... is simply thrust into his jaws, ... and then water is poured onto his face, down his throat and nose, ... until the man gives some sign of giving in or becomes unconscious. ... His suffering must be that of a man who is drowning but who cannot drown.”

Edmund Morris, in the second volume of his brilliant biography of Theodore Roosevelt, recounts how a master politician took over the situation. Roosevelt met with his Cabinet and demanded a full briefing on the Philippine situation. Elihu Root, the secretary of war, reported that an officer accused of the water torture had been ordered to stand trial.

Dissatisfied, Roosevelt sent a cable to the commander of the U.S. Army in the Philippines, stating: “The president desires to know in the fullest and most circumstantial manner all the facts, ... for the very reason that the president intends to back up the Army in the heartiest fashion in every lawful and legitimate method of doing its work; he also intends to see that the most vigorous care is exercised to detect and prevent any cruelty or brutality and that men who are guilty thereof are punished. Great as the provocation has been in dealing with foes who habitually resort to treachery, murder and torture against our men, nothing can justify or will be held to justify the use of torture or inhuman conduct of any kind on the part of the American Army.”

Roosevelt also ordered the court-martial of the American general on the island of Samar, where some of the worst abuses had occurred. He did so “under conditions which will give me the right of review.” The court-martial cleared the general of the charges, found only that he had behaved with excessive zeal and “admonished” him against repetition.

Roosevelt responded by disregarding the verdict of the court-martial and ordering the general’s dismissal from the Army. Morris wrote that Roosevelt’s decision “won universal praise” from Democrats, who congratulated him for acknowledging cruelty in the Philippine campaign, and from Republicans, who said that he had “upheld the national honor.”

Daily Telegraph (UK): Bill Clinton Top US Liberal

From the Telegraph's list of top 20 US liberals:

1. BILL CLINTON
Former US president


The 42nd president of the United States is now auditioning for the role of what his Scottish friends term “First Laddie”. Having been impeached for lying about his sexual misdeeds during the Lewinsky scandal, blamed by some for failing to kill Osama bin Laden and having left office in 2001 amid accusations of corruption in granting last-minute pardons, Clinton, 61, has made a remarkable comeback. Perhaps everything Hillary Clinton knows about politics, bar self-discipline, she has learnt from him.

A peerless tactician, huge intellect and natural communicator, Bill Clinton was one of the great retail politicians of the 20th century. His burning desire to see his wife Hillary elected president has much to do with his own quest for vindication and a fresh platform to make his mark on history. Likely to become a roving ambassador in his wife’s administration, he will push for the Middle East peace that slipped his grasp in 2000. Whether Americans truly want a Clinton restoration will become clearer next year. Either way, Bill Clinton’s influence on the American Left in 2008 will be without equal.

Daily Telegraph (UK): Giuliani Top US Conservative

From the Telegraph's list of top 20 US conservatives:

1. RUDY GIULIANI
Republican presidential candidate

The clear Republican front runner and perhaps the only party nominee who could beat Hillary Clinton in 2008, Giuliani makes the top of our list despite his unorthodox brand of conservatism that is anathema to many on the Christian Right. Before 9/11, a thrice-married New Yorker in favour of abortion and gay rights and gun control would have struggled to survive the early stages of a Republican nomination battle despite his tax cutting and crime fighting credentials. But even many Christian conservatives who disagree with the former New York mayor on social issues now view national security as their number one priority.

Giuliani's performance after 9/11 made him an international figure and helped make a nation feel good about itself just after its darkest hour. But 9/11 is the centrepiece of the Giuliani campaign in more than just that respect - he is determined to confront America's enemies, including Iran, and has taken on an array of hawkish advisers. Meetings with Tony Blair and Gordon Brown while in London to receive an award from Margaret Thatcher underlined his global stature. All the stars are in alignment for a Democratic victory in 2008 but Giuliani has the potential to buck the historical trends and signal a dramatic shift in American conservatism by securing an unlikely win.

City Journal Explains Giuliani's Prostate Cancer Rate Claims

David Gratzer writes:

Let me be very clear about why the Giuliani campaign is correct: the percentage of people diagnosed with prostate cancer who die from it is much higher in Britain than in the United States. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development reports on both the incidence of prostate cancer in member nations and the number of resultant deaths. According to OECD data published in 2000, 49 Britons per 100,000 were diagnosed with prostate cancer, and 28 per 100,000 died of it. This means that 57 percent of Britons diagnosed with prostate cancer died of it; and, consequently, that just 43 percent survived. Economist John Goodman, in Lives at Risk, arrives at precisely the same conclusion: “In the United States, slightly less than one in five people diagnosed with prostate cancer dies of the disease. In the United Kingdom, 57 percent die.” None of this is surprising: in the UK, only about 40 percent of cancer patients see an oncologist, and historically, the government has been reluctant to fund new (and often better) cancer drugs.

So why do the critics think that Britain’s survival rates are as high as America’s? The main reason is that they are citing overall mortality rates, which are indeed, as Ezra Klein writes, similar across various countries. That is, the percentage of all Americans who die from prostate cancer is similar to the percentage of all Britons who do. But this misses the point, since a much higher percentage of Americans than Britons are diagnosed with prostate cancer in the first place. If you are a patient already diagnosed with prostate cancer, like Rudy Giuliani, your chances of survival—as Giuliani correctly said—are far higher in the United States.

Gratzer is the Canadian doctor who published The Ugly Truth About Canadian Health Care in the Summer, 2007 issue of City Journal, which contained this claim:

And if we measure a health-care system by how well it serves its sick citizens, American medicine excels. Five-year cancer survival rates bear this out. For leukemia, the American survival rate is almost 50 percent; the European rate is just 35 percent. Esophageal carcinoma: 12 percent in the United States, 6 percent in Europe. The survival rate for prostate cancer is 81.2 percent here, yet 61.7 percent in France and down to 44.3 percent in England—a striking variation.

Strategies for Encouraging Democratic Reform in Saudi Arabia

Don't know if Huma Abedin has commented on Ali Alyami's recent publication from the Center for Democracy and Human Rights in Saudi Arabia: Strategies for Encouraging Democratic Reform in Saudi Arabia: The Path and Obstacles to Democratization and Respect for Human Rights. An excerpt:

In the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the US , The Center for Democracy and Human Rights in Saudi Arabia (CDHR), located in Washington, DC, was established as a non-sectarian, non-partisan and educational tax exempt organization to shed light on the Saudi government’s political, social, educational, economic and religious institutions and their role in mobilizing well-to-do Saudi nationals to plan and carryout a catastrophic mission against Saudi Arabia’s main Western partner, the United States of America. Careful investigations by the global media after 9/11 showed that the current structure and practices of Saudi institutions contribute to the creation of an environment that instills hate for, and intolerance of, other peoples, and rejection of their empowering democratic contributions because of their beliefs, lifestyles and scientific accomplishments.

CDHR sought, and was awarded, a grant to research and write a White Paper titled: “Strategies for Encouraging Democratic Reforms in Saudi Arabia”. This paper is intended to assist US officials, business executives, educators and NGO’s in promoting peaceful political reforms, accountability, transparency and rule of civil laws in Saudi Arabia. After intense research to unearth reliable resources and numerous contacts with a number of Saudi men and women, which proved to be very challenging, the Center would like to offer some practical, prudent, and constructive suggestions for peaceful and achievable reforms:

One, empower and expand the membership of the existing 150 members of the 16-year-old appointed Majlis Al-Shura, or “National Parliament” to become a representative legislative body.

Two, empower Saudi women to become full citizens and participating members of society in all decisions and activities that affect their daily lives and the future of their country.

Three, establish committees to start organizing for free elections at local, regional and municipal levels to elect qualified people regardless of race, gender, religion, ethnic and regional background to serve the people and ensure their rights are protected.

Four, create a transparent treasury where public wealth is managed and regulated by the empowered representative national parliament.

Five, create a process whereby the judicial system is removed from the hands of religious clerics and placed in the hands of independent persons properly trained in the rule of law.

Six, for all officials, without any exception, financial compensation should be limited, regulated, and open to public scrutiny .

Seven, initiate a committee of qualified and independent experts to draft a comprehensive plan for transparent privatization of all government-owned and controlled industries and public utilities.

Eight, all public policies, budget decisions and official assignments should be initiated and approved by a national parliament and other freely elected representatives at all levels of society.

Nine, all government contracts should be regulated by the elected representatives of the people.

Ten, non-sectarian national, regional and local constitutions should be developed to protect the people from government abuses and ensure the rights of all citizens.

You can download the entire document in PDF format, here. There's more about this report from POMED, the Project on Middle East Democracy:

Ali Alyami began by mentioning Mrs. Bush’s recent visit to Saudi Arabia to speak to women about breast cancer and told how she “donned the Saudi black abaya out of respect for the culture.” However, he argued that “the abaya represents the most dehumanizing and repressive policy” and that it is not about culture or tradition, but a pure Saudi-Wahhabi plot. He suggested that Saudi women would have been better served by Mrs. Bush helping them fight their segregation and gain their rights than talking about cancer.

He went on to speak about several “steps” that have been taken by the Saudi government, but argued that they mean nothing in terms of real change and reform. First, he pointed out that King Abdullah has met with reformers and had national dialog meetings. However, none of the recommendations have been carried out. Also, the staff of human rights associations that were formed are appointed and paid by the government, making them meaningless. Finally, while there have been municipal council elections, women and the armed forces were disenfranchised, and the councils have no power.

Interestingly the POMED conference featured Thomas Melia of Freedom House, who used to live down the street from us and wear an Afghan hat (I guess a souvenir from Kabul); and David Mikosz of the Center for Democracy and Election Management at the American University, whom I last saw in Tashkent, where he was working for IREX on IT, before he went to Kazakhstan for the World Bank, and then to Kyrgyzstan to do election work for IFES, a US government-funded NGO. Small world...

Stewart Taylor's Until Proven Innocent

Caught Stewart Taylor on the PBS Newshour with Jim Lehrer last night, talking about his new book (with KC Johnson), Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case. Boy did he sound angry. When the scandal was first reported, in places like Ed Bradley's expose on 60 Minutes, it seemed so seemy and sordid that I didn't want to hear any more. But Taylor's steely mien, his condemnation of the Duke University administration, the media, the politics surrounding the case, especially his critique of The New York Times, made me want to take another look. Unfortunately, PBS has not yet posted a transcript. Luckily, the book can be purchased from Amazon.com at this link.

Driver's License Plan for Illegal Immigrants Threatens American Society

Hillary Clinton is in trouble for a reason. Someone I know points out that, at a fundamental level, the problem with New York Governor Spitzer's plan to give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants is not that it makes immigration easier--rather, it establishes a legal framework for a 2-tier society containing an underclass of 2nd-class residents. This, she argued, would be like the Missouri Compromise prior to the Civil War, or Jim Crow after Reconstruction--a politically expedient course designed to defer the problem. Such a failure of leadership leads to more fundamental problems, much more difficult to resolve, such as erosion of rule-of-law and constitutional guarantees of equal protection. Good leadership, as Ronald Reagan demonstrated (and I hope Rudy Giuliani will again, soon), requires making difficult decisions--not ducking them...

Chechen Leader Calls for Jihad Against US, UK & Israel

The BBC reports Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov's call to arms (ht jihadwatch.com):

Our common enemies are all those who have attacked Muslims wherever they are.

"Not only Russia, but also the USA, the UK, Israel and all those waging war against Islam and Muslims are our enemies."

Gary Kasparov on Vladimir Putin

From Daniel Henninger's profile in the Wall Street Journal:

We made him a contributing editor to the Journal editorial page, and in the years since he has written often for these pages on Russia's wild ride to its current state. Across 16 years, Mr. Kasparov's commitment to democratic liberty in Russia and in its former republics has been unstinting. At that September 1991 lunch, Mr. Kasparov proposed an idea then anathema to elite thinking in Washington and the capitals of Western Europe: The West should announce support for the independence of the former Soviet republics--the Baltics, Ukraine, Armenia, Georgia, Moldova and the rest.

One suspects that Vladimir Putin noticed what the young chess champion was saying in 1991 about the old Soviet empire. The Russian president has famously said, "The demise of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century."

Russia today is not what it was. Mr. Kasparov, however, has not stopped analyzing what it has become. Briefly, he argues that Mr. Putin's internal and external politics should be seen almost wholly as a function of oil prices, the primary source of revenue for the Russian state and the prop beneath the extended Putin political family. Mr. Putin's "unhelpful" policies on Iran and the like, Mr. Kasparov argues, keep the oil markets boiling--but not boiling over. Money in the bank, at $94 a barrel. He says Mr. Putin is the glue that binds this fabulously wealthy family, and if he left politics in any real sense they would start killing each other.

Who is Huma Abedin?

Hard to believe, hope this is not true (ht lgf):

This is Hillary Clinton’s top aide. Goes with her everywhere. And, according to Vogue magazine, "fluent in Arabic, and a practicing Muslim born in Kalamazoo, MI, to a Pakistani mother and Indian father. Moved to Saudi Arabia when she was two…Her father is an Islamic scholar…." This story is a real eye-opener.

Am I the only person who thinks it is strange that Mrs. Clinton has a top aide who is a Muslim raised in Saudi Arabia? What is going on here?

Paul Sperry’s book, Infiltration: How Muslim Spies and Subversives have Penetrated Washington has become more and more relevant, hasn’t it?

More from Spencer Morgan's April, 2007 profile in The New York Observer:

The back story, as it were, begins 32 years ago in Kalamazoo, Mich., where Ms. Abedin, who declined to participate in this article, lived until the age of 2. Her family then relocated to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where she lived until returning to the States for college. She attended George Washington University. Her father, who died when she was 17, was an Islamic and Middle Eastern scholar of Indian decent. He founded his own institute devoted to Western-Eastern and interfaith understanding and reconciliation and published a journal focusing on Muslim minorities living in the diaspora. Her mother, a renowned professor in Saudi Arabia, is Pakistani.

Ms. Abedin recently bought an apartment in the vicinity of 12th and U streets in Washington, D.C. When she comes to New York, she stays with her sister, who has an apartment in Manhattan—not, as one popular rumor has it, in Chappaqua with the Clintons. She has no children and has never been married. She’s single.

Ms. Abedin began working for Mrs. Clinton as an intern for the then First Lady in 1996. She was hired as a staff assistant to the First Lady’s chief of staff, Maggie Williams. For several years, she was the backup to Mrs. Clinton’s permanent personal aide, Allison Stein, and she officially took over as Mrs. Clinton’s aide and advisor around the time of the 2000 Senate race.

Her Presidential campaign title is “traveling chief of staff."

Google informs us that Abedin's mother is Saleha Mahmood Abedin, Vice-Dean of Institutional Advancement, Dar Al-Hekma College, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Here's the official description from the Dar Al-Hekma website:

Dar Al-Hekma College is a unique, four-year college, built upon a strong and stable foundation of Islamic faith, Islamic wisdom, academic excellence and intellectual curiosity. It was founded when prominent members of the Jeddah community recognized an urgent need for sophisticated higher education for young Saudi women, with high quality academic programs enriched by Islamic values and morals. The Founders engaged the Texas International Education Consortium to work with local and international experts to plan the college and design its curricula. In September, 1999, Dar Al-Hekma College opened its doors to its first freshmen class.

Curiously, Wikipedia has posted an announcement that it is considering deleting its entry for Huma Abedin...