Ourselves to blame! Obama 's Fleet of Buses!

More commentary about Russia. (See 1 below.)

McCain touches the third rail of Social Security at his peril as Democrats continue to play politics with this hot issue.

If every time a politician acknowledges we have a looming problem, members of the opposition attack to gain political points rather than debate the merits, the monster will simply grow.

Some privatization approach is a win win over the long term. It would provide needed capital for American business and higher retirement incomes while taking funds away from members of Congress who have consistently violated their fiduciary trust. If members of Congress were not immune from law suits they would all be in jail for their corrupt practices regarding how they have appropriated Social Security funds and used them as general funds.

We trusted them with the cookie jar and they not only ate all the cookies but broke the jar as well and we re-elect these bums year after year. Far too many have Gerrymandered themselves beyond reach into safe seats and we still call it representative government.

In the final analysis we deserve everything we are getting because we have only ourselves to blame. (See 2 below.)

Some retroactive thoughts and speculation regarding Iraq had Obama been in charge. Someone sent me an e mail of a sign that said: Any taxpayer voting for Obama is like a Chicken voting for Col Sanders. (See 3 below.)

They say oil and water do not mix. O'Shea suggests neither does veracity and Obama. Obama must own a fleet of buses!(See 4 below.)

GW out-slicks and out-gushes Congress regarding oil drilling. (See 5 below.)

Never a day goes by without new tensions. This time a continuation of Israel's concerns over the Iranian occupation of Lebanon's Sannine peak I posted and called attention to in a previous memo. (See 6 below.)

Another U.S. icon - Anheuser Busch - loses its head! This could help both Miller as well as micro breweries as American beer buffs re-buff InBev.

Dick

1) Back In the USSR?
By Leon Aron


Vladimir Putin's appointment this spring as prime minister of the symbolic "union" of Russia and Belarus was yet another example of the troubling similarities between today's Russia and the other most stable and prosperous Russian regime of the past 80 years: Leonid Brezhnev's Soviet Union in the 1970s. That economy, too, was fueled by then-record oil prices. And while there are clear differences between the two Russias, if these tendencies go unchecked, the increasingly authoritarian and economically statist country may soon face crises of the kind that became apparent under Brezhnev and contributed to the Soviet Union's demise.

The most disturbing of these propensities include:

· The national alcoholic binge. In the 1970s, Soviets annually consumed eight liters of strong (40 to 80 percent proof) alcoholic beverages per person -- more than any other country. Between 1964 and 1980, male life expectancy fell from 67 to 62. Today, per capita consumption of vodka, which is four times cheaper in relation to the average salary than 30 years ago, has grown to 10 liters, according to official statistics (outside experts say it is higher). By contrast, the most recent data available from the World Health Organization show the corresponding U.S. figure is 2.57 liters. One in 10 Russian men is thought to be an alcoholic. Life expectancy for Russian men is less than 60.6 years, more than 15 years shorter than in the United States and European Union and below current levels in Pakistan or Bangladesh.
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· Oil-for-food. This spring, Putin admitted that 70 percent of the food consumed in Russia's largest cities is imported, a situation he decried as "intolerable." This problem, too, first surfaced in the 1970s, when grain imports were so high that by the end of the decade they supplied the flour for every third loaf of bread. When oil prices collapsed, Russia was forced to spend gold reserves and seek loans -- and eventually found itself without grain or gold. After agricultural land was denationalized in the early 1990s, food became available almost immediately -- for the first time in almost 70 years it could be had without hours-long lines and rationing coupons. Russia started to export grain. Yet agricultural land was never legally privatized, and rules for long-term leasing have been left to local authorities.

Not surprisingly, such legal gray areas have given rise to corruption, increased production costs and hampered innovation. Provincial governors, who are no longer elected and answer only to the president, pressure successful entrepreneurs and farmers to "share" with local authorities. A leading industrialist told me that at least six local agencies conduct almost weekly "inspections" of his potato farm. State agriculture subsidies often go to the largest and best politically connected enterprises, not necessarily the most productive ones.

The ruble's steady appreciation because of huge petro-dollar inflows further depresses the domestic food industry. Should Russia allow the ruble to float, at least partially, to help curb inflation, it would become even more expensive, encouraging demand for better-quality and, often cheaper, imported food.

Putin's remedies have the same flavor as Brezhnev's: Throw billions in subsidized credits and grants at the problem instead of strengthening property rights and making it easier for independent producers to compete.

· One-party rule. With its opposition marginalized and demoralized, and election results rigged, United Russia has emerged as the "ruling party," the term that used be reserved for the Soviet Communist Party. "Today we are the party responsible for the government," a top United Russia functionary told a Russian newspaper this year, "since our leader [Putin, the party's chairman] is the chairman of the government." Those who argue, rightly, that United Russia membership is only a ticket for ambitious apparatchiks to punch should remember that there was precious little ideological fervor and much cynicism in the 1970s as well. Lack of sincerity then did nothing to ameliorate the absence of corrective societal feedback and, with it, the inability to reverse dead-end policies that led to the crisis.

· A new oligarchy. Brezhnev drew some of his loudest cheers in his six-hour "reports" to party congresses when he declared "respect for the cadres." Delivering his presidential valediction this spring, Putin's longest applause came when he cited "stability" as his crowning achievement.

With virtually every top Putin official and adviser retained, sent to the Security Council or made "presidential envoy" to some part of the country, a new nomenklatura has emerged -- insulated from media criticism, spared political competition and effectively immune from criminal prosecution. As in Soviet times, the members of this political master race are almost never fired, only retired with honors or reassigned. Since the Putin "Politburo" and "Central Committee" are a good 20 years younger than Brezhnev's, retirement is not an option.

The 1970s made clear what the belief in official infallibility and omnipotence, utter disregard for public opinion, ossification, and pandemic corruption could lead to. Most of all, the experience of Brezhnev's Russia confirms that authoritarian "stabilization" is a curious political commodity. Its benefits are instantly apparent but its price is revealed only gradually -- and may be devastatingly high. As he moves forward, President Dmitry Medvedev would do well to remember the lessons from Russia's other most stable regime.

2) McCain takes a Social Security risk
By Peter Wallsten

The Republican seems willing to consider privatization -- and Democrats aim to use that to sway senior voters.


WASHINGTON -- It was a spectacular flop: a president making dozens of fruitless trips around the country to build support for a plan his own party's leadership refused to accept.

But President Bush's failed push to privatize Social Security has not deterred John McCain from putting forward the same idea -- and from risking a similar political disaster.

McCain, the presumed Republican presidential nominee, spoke several times last week about changing how the popular retirement program is funded, at one point calling it a "disgrace" that younger workers are forced to pay for a plan that, in his view, is unlikely to benefit them when they retire.

Democrats are gearing up to turn McCain's stand on Social Security, and his willingness to consider a privatization plan, into a key campaign issue. They say changing the program in that way would undermine retirees' benefits, and they hope to use the issue to harm the Arizona senator's support among a set of voters who tilt toward him -- seniors.

On Tuesday, a coalition of Democratic strategists, labor unions and liberal activist groups that helped defeat Bush's efforts in 2005 plans to launch a similar campaign. They intend to target McCain and dozens of GOP congressional candidates who have supported proposals to allow workers to divert some of their payroll taxes out of the Social Security system and into private investment accounts.

The groups, coordinating with the Democratic National Committee and strategists for the party's presumed presidential nominee, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, will focus on organizing seniors -- a key voting bloc in Florida and several other battleground states and one that has been courted heavily by McCain.

"McCain ought to realize that Bush got burned terribly on this, and nothing's changed," said Edward F. Coyle, executive director of one group, Alliance for Retired Americans.

This week, the coalition -- which began laying its plans Friday in a conference call arranged by the DNC -- will start demonstrating at McCain's events and offices, particularly in key states with many seniors. The group has ordered thousands of signs with "Hands Off My Social Security" on one side and "My Social Security Is Not a Disgrace" on the other.

Although the party can work with outside groups on grass-roots organizing, campaign laws prohibit those groups from coordinating with the party on paid advertising. Some organization officials said Sunday that they anticipated acting on their own to pour money into TV and radio spots targeting McCain and other Republicans on the issue.

"This could well be McCain's Achilles' heel with regard to large numbers of people who are already Social Security retirees and the baby boomer generation, which is getting ready to retire," said Charles M. Loveless, legislation director for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which helped fund the 2005 effort and expects to spend millions this year.

McCain's remarks on Social Security came during a week that showcased his ideas for the economy. When asked by a young woman at a Denver town hall meeting last Monday how to make Social Security viable for her generation, he said she could not rely on the system "unless we fix it."

"We are paying present-day retirees with the taxes paid by young workers in America today," he said. "And that's a disgrace. It's an absolute disgrace, and it's got to be fixed."

His comments seemed to suggest that McCain favored a new funding mechanism for Social Security benefits, such as private accounts. Later, on CNN, McCain seemed to fully embrace the idea of private accounts. "I want young workers to be able to, if they choose, to take part of their own money, which is their taxes, and put it in an account which has their name on it," he said. Participation would be a "voluntary thing," he said, and "would not affect any present-day retirees or the system as necessary."

The remarks drew fire from Democrats, who accused McCain of failing to understand a system that since its creation in the 1930s has relied on payroll taxes from current workers to fund benefits for current retirees. Some supporters of this system say that allowing younger workers to divert money into private accounts would reduce the tax money needed to provide benefits for older workers once they retired.

Considering that McCain has been trying to demonstrate his understanding of Americans' economic woes, his timing was odd -- endorsing a new reliance on the stock market in the same week that the Dow Jones industrial average dipped to its lowest point in two years.

His aides said Democrats were misrepresenting his statements; his only plan for fixing Social Security, they said, is forging a bipartisan compromise that considers all options.

Still, McCain did not back down, saying later in the week that "it's terrible to ask people to pay into a system that they won't receive benefits from."

At issue is how to shore up the finances of the Social Security system, which will come under pressure as more than 70 million baby boomers -- the generation born between 1946 and 1964 -- enter retirement and receive their benefits.

A government report in March painted a gloomy picture of the program's future, estimating that its costs will surpass payroll tax revenue in 2017 -- forcing the system to rely on a trust fund that, the report said, will go broke in 2041.

After that, workers' payroll taxes would cover only a fraction of the benefits promised to retirees.

Most experts agree that fixing the system will require benefit reductions, tax increases, a rise in the retirement age, or some combination of the three. Obama, who opposes private accounts, has proposed raising taxes on people who earn more than $250,000 a year. Workers and their employers now split a 12.4% payroll tax on earnings up to $102,000. Obama's plan would lift that cap, creating what he calls a "doughnut hole" to protect people who make less than $250,000 from having their payroll taxes go up. Critics say Obama's plan alone would not cover the shortfall.

McCain's position has been somewhat fuzzy.

In 2005, he traveled with Bush to promote the administration's overhaul plan, including the controversial private accounts. In one appearance, he tried to mollify AARP, the powerful seniors' lobby that opposed such accounts, pleading for the group to "come to the table with us."

At the time, GOP strategists viewed the plan as a way to woo a savvy and growing "investor class" of voters, even if it cost the party some seniors' support.

But now his campaign website says McCain supports “supplementing” the current Social Security system with private accounts -- suggesting that he may not now support letting workers divert their taxes in a way that would reduce revenue for the system.

"It isn't very coherent right now, what he's saying," said Michael Tanner, a Social Security analyst at the libertarian Cato Institute and a leading proponent of private accounts.

McCain and his aides say the lack of specificity is intentional -- the result of lessons from 2005, when Bush tried to sell a skeptical public on private accounts.

"There's a really careful recognition of the history," said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, McCain's economic advisor.

"The history on Social Security has been if you put out specific proposals or preconditions, you polarize the debate and the deal doesn't get done."

Democrats said they intended to paint McCain as an enemy of Social Security.

Several strategists interviewed Sunday were vague about their plans, saying that the organization was still being put together.

Loveless, of the public workers' union, said his group would probably invest at least $2 million in the campaign and would focus its grass-roots mobilization efforts in Florida because of its large number of retirees.

Another labor-backed group, Americans United for Change, is planning a protest in the retiree hub of Las Vegas and may pay for recorded phone calls targeting senior voters in battleground states. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee plans to weigh in as well, having compiled target lists of incumbent Republicans who backed Bush's privatization plan.

Organizers said they would try to target McCain as much as possible, even staging a protest outside his vacation home in Sedona, Ariz.

3) Iraq and the Surrounding Region, As Obama Wanted It
By Patrick J. Casey

It's worthwhile for us to imagine what Iraq would look like today had Barack Obama been in control way back in 2007, particularly as Iran launches missiles over the Persian Gulf and continues its unabated quest for nuclear weapons. How would we be positioned to deal with the Iranian Threat? (At the moment, Obama's only response is to blame the Bush Administration and call for stronger diplomacy.

During 2007, Obama had very specific suggestions on what we should do militarily in Iraq. Had we gone along with them, as most Democrats other than Joe Lieberman wanted to, and taking into account the trends that were present in Iraq during 2006 and pre-surge 2007, what would that region look like now?

On April 10th 2007, Barack Obama participated in a Town Hall forum for Presidential candidates sponsored by Moveon.org. This was three months after President Bush announced his plan for the surge in Iraq, but before it had been fully implemented. Obama promised the audience that if he were to have his way, he would begin unconditional troop withdrawals on May 1st, 2007, and that the last troops would leave Iraq by March 31, 2008.

Obama indicated that there was no military solution in Iraq, and had himself introduced legislation in January 2007 to force his timetable on the troops. That legislation, The Iraq War De-escalation Act of 2007, would have also prevented the surge troops from being deployed.

The Bugging Out Scenario

Luckily, the world will never experience what the region would look like had Barack Obama had his way. But at the very least, it is safe to say violence would have continued to increase rather than decrease (as it had been trending), and 15 of the 18 political benchmarks would certainly not have been reached.

So let's look at the scenario of Obama's unconditional "bugging out" of US troops from Iraq in a bit more detail than just an assumption that things would have gone, generally, to hell. The violence within Iraq that erupted in 2006, especially after the al-Askari Mosque bombing, seemed to portend the eventual breakup of Iraq, had the surge not taken place. At that time, it was difficult to argue against the viewpoint that we were watching the disintegration of the country of Iraq before our eyes, and doing nothing proactive to stop it.

Breakaway Regions

Had Obama had his way, there's a good chance that Iran would have fully taken over the Shia region in southern Iraq both directly and via its proxy Muqtada al-Sadr, separating it from the rest of Iraq and fulfilling its desire for a larger Shia Islamic State. That would have meant that Iran would have not only controlled its own oil, but also a significant part of Iraqi oil as well. The Mullahs and Ahmadinejad might well be running Basra, the oil platforms in the Persian Gulf, the al Faw peninsula and the port of Umm Qsar -- making it uncomfortably easy for Iran to shut off the flow of Middle East oil and shipping to the rest of the world.

In the north, there would be a separate war going on, potentially involving several different countries -- a conflict much worse that the current occasional border skirmish between the Kurds and Turks. As Northern Iraq could have broken off from Baghdad in the face of other disintegration, there's a good chance that Turkey would either be contemplating or have already commenced a full scale invasion of the breakway Kurdish region -- since the expressed goal of many of the Northern Iraqi Kurds is to eventually unite all of historical Kurdistan in one large independent country, something Turkey has vowed to prevent militarily. Since the territory of Kurdistan includes not only land currently located in Iraq and Turkey, but also territory in Iran and Syria, the situation wouldn't have been pretty.

That would leave the traditional Sunni territory surrounding Baghdad alone, and with little or no natural resources. The capital city itself would probably look a lot like Beirut right now, with Al Qaeda in control, and would remain under terrorist control for the foreseeable future.

As all of this would have been taking place, one or two brigades of combat troops a month would have been leaving Iraq under orders from Obama, putting increased pressure on the remaining US troops. Both Al Qaeda and Iran would be justifiably claiming victory over America, handing them the greatest recruitment tool for terrorist groups ever seen. Terrorist attacks against our troops in Iraq and elsewhere with the resultant loss of life and injuries would be increasing, rather than decreasing.

Pressure to Return

What would be the rest of the world's reaction? It's safe to say that there would be mounting international pressure on the United States to stop its retreat and go back into Iraq forcefully -- essentially to fix what had been broken. If Obama decided to do so (remember, he said that there was no military solution), it would then require fighting a larger regional war in Iraq on three major fronts:

1) in the north against the forces and influences of Turkey, Iran, and Syria;

2) in the south against al-Sadr and Iran; and

3) in central Iraq on the streets of Baghdad against Al Qaeda.

Such military action would have required many times more than the number of surge troops that President Bush ordered into Iraq (and Obama tried to stop) in January of 2007.

It's also important to note that the primary reason why Iraq was spiraling out of control in 2006 was not because of military action, but because of the lack of it. The United States had stopped aggressively prosecuting the war, instead choosing to use diplomacy as its main instrument in addressing the deteriorating situation within the country. In essence, we had stopped fighting the war offensively prior to the enemy being vanquished and real security established. Call it the State Department method of conducting warfare. That was the strategy that needed to be changed, and President Bush did so by replacing the failed commanders in the region and launching the surge. Barack Obama, on the other hand, while publicly requesting "a change in tactics", offered only a plan (S.433) of retreat and surrender.

Today, we must look back at the clearly stated actions (retreat, no surge) that Obama wanted to take in 2007, and compare them to the results that we can see today of the change in strategy ordered by President Bush that the presumed Democratic Presidential nominee so forcefully opposed at that time.

With that in mind, why should we trust anything that Obama now says about diplomacy or military action in the region that includes Iraq and Iran? If there is even a second of hesitation in answering that question, then Barack Obama should not be elected President and Commander-in-Chief of our armed forces, especially during a time of war.

Our enemies are licking their chops....

4) Yet Another Obama
By Michael J. O'Shea


Behold Barack doing yet another Obama, this one vintage 2006:

But what I know is, Joe Lieberman's a man with a good heart, with a keen intellect, who cares about the working families of America. I am absolutely certain that Connecticut's going to have the good sense to send Joe Lieberman back to the United States Senate.


Ooops.

Or in the words of The Washington Post - a scant six months later:

Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, a vocal defender of Sen. Joe Lieberman earlier this year, is urging Connecticut voters to rally behind his rival, Ned Lamont.


Not that that would have surprised William F. Buckley who, just prior to the Obama swithceroo, noted that "in politics, vows of fidelity are renewable every 24 hours."

The Buckley-Lieberman bond is as uplifting as the Obama-Lieberman link is a downer.

Buckley on Lieberman:

Joe Lieberman is a singular human being. He has personal support from people who know him, and who sense in him a true love for God and country.


Lieberman on Buckley:

I have lost a dear and cherished friend who I have known for more than 40 years.

One could disagree with him -- as I did quite frequently -- and never lose respect or affection, dare I say love, for a wonderful human being.


Contrast that with the crassness of Barack Obama:

* latching on to Lieberman -- who, when Obama was just a two-year-old, had registered Black voters in Mississippi -- as his senate mentor,

* whooshing to Connecticut to rally support for his colleague's re-election,

* then forking over $5,000 to defeat the man who had embraced him from the start.


Barack Obama speaks frequently of the Golden Rule, but lives one of his own: If he helps my career, flaunt him; if he doesn't, dump him. That rule is universal, applying to principle as well as people, the sacred as well as the profane - anything, and anyone, that gets in the way, anything, and anyone, to get ahead.

Barack Obama boasts that world leaders would look to him. But what would they see if they did? Would they glimpse in him what Margaret Thatcher saw in Mikhail Gorbachev?

I like Mr. Gorbachev. We can do business together. We both believe in our own political systems. He firmly believes in his; I firmly believe in mine. We are never going to change one another. So that is not in doubt, but we have two great interests in common.


What leader would know what Barack Obama "firmly believes" -- or that he firmly believes anything at all?

It's not just hard to have faith in Barack Obama, it's hard to have faith in his faith itself. Just last week he said,

it's been a journey that began decades ago on the South Side of Chicago, when, working as a community organizer, helping to build struggling neighborhoods, I let Jesus Christ into my life.


But just last year his spiritual saga had a different paternity:

And I heard Reverend Jeremiah A. Wright deliver a sermon called "The Audacity of Hope." And during the course of that sermon, he introduced me to someone named Jesus Christ.


But then Jeremiah got in the way, as had Joe, so Jeremiah and Joe both had to go. Both learned what America and the world may learn too late - that the one thing you can count on about Barack Obama is that you can't count on Barack Obama.

No matter how scholarly about Scripture this "devout Christian" purports to be, he can't fathom Christ's simple command: "Simply let your ‘Yes' be ‘Yes' and your ‘No' be ‘No.'" Be a man of your word.

No matter how often he cites Old Testament and New, he misses the Bible's single, simple message: keep your word. God keeps His to you, keep yours to Him and to your fellow man.

No matter how often he cites his Hawaiian or Kansas or Selma or other American roots, he still doesn't grasp, much less live, what the Founders declared:

And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.


That pledge had weight because all 56 signers were men of their word.

So, too, Bill Buckley, so, too, Joe Lieberman -- Christian and Jew, conservative and liberal -- yet steadfast: men of honor, men of their word.

And then there's Barack Obama: a man of words whose word is worthless.

5) Bush trumps Congress; Moves first on drilling
By BEN FELLER

Putting pressure on congressional Democrats to back more exploration for oil, President Bush on Monday lifted an executive ban on offshore drilling that has stood since his father was president.


But the move, by itself, will do nothing unless Congress acts as well.

There are two prohibitions on offshore drilling, one imposed by Congress and another by executive order signed by the first President Bush in 1990. The current president, trying to ease market tensions and boost supply, called last month for Congress to lift its prohibition before he did so himself.

"The only thing standing between the American people and these vast oil resources is action from the U.S. Congress," Bush said in a statement in the Rose Garden. "Now the ball is squarely in Congress' court."

Bush criticized Congress for failing to lift its own ban on offshore drilling.

"For years, my administration has been calling on Congress to expand domestic oil production," Bush said. "Unfortunately, Democrats on Capitol Hill have rejected virtually every proposal. And now Americans are paying at the pump."

Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, called Bush's move "a very important signal" and said his Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama, should drop his opposition to offshore drilling.

Congressional Democrats, joined by some GOP lawmakers from coastal states, have opposed lifting the prohibition that has barred energy companies from waters along both the East and West coasts and in the eastern Gulf of Mexico. A succession of presidents, from Bush's father — George H.W. Bush — to Bill Clinton, have sided against drilling in these waters, as has Congress each year for 27 years. Their goal has to been to protect beaches and coastal states' tourism economies.

"Once again, the oilman in the White House is echoing the demands of Big Oil," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. "The Bush plan is a hoax. It will neither reduce gas prices nor increase energy independence. It just gives millions more acres to the same companies that are sitting on nearly 68 million acres of public lands and coastal areas."

"This proposal is something you'd expect from an oil company CEO, not the president of the United States," said Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Senate Environment Committee. "The president is taking special-interest government to a new level and threatening our thriving coastal economy."

Environmental groups, too, blasted Bush's move.

"President Bush has once again ignored the wise precedent set by his father and taken reckless action that has neither hope of reducing gas prices nor concern for long-term consequences," said Gene Karpinski, president of The League of Conservation Voters.

Asked if Bush's action alone will lead to more oil drilling, White House press secretary Dana Perino said, "In terms of allowing more exploration to go forward? No, it does not."

The president, in his final months of office, has turned to increased oil exploration among other options amid record gas-prices. None would have immediate impact on prices at the pump, according to White House officials, who say there is no quick fix. But starting action now would help, they say.

Bush's proposal echoes a call by Republican presidential candidate, Sen. John McCain, to open the Outer Continental Shelf for exploration. Democrat Barack Obama has opposed the idea and instead argued for helping consumers with a second economic stimulus package including energy rebates, as well as stepped up efforts to develop alternative fuels and more fuel-efficient automobiles.

"If offshore drilling would provide short-term relief at the pump or a long-term strategy for energy independence, it would be worthy of our consideration, regardless of the risks," spokesman Bill Burton said in a statement. "But most experts, even within the Bush administration, concede it would do neither. It would merely prolong the failed energy policies we have seen from Washington for thirty years."

Congressional Democrats have rejected the push to lift the drilling moratorium, accusing the president of hoping the U.S. can drill its way out a problem.

Bush says offshore drilling could yield up to 18 billion barrels of oil over time, although it would take years for production to start. Bush also says offshore drilling would take pressure off prices over time. In addition, the president has proposed opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for drilling, lifting restrictions on oil shale leasing in the Green River Basin of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming and easing the regulatory process to expand oil refining capacity.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and other lawmakers have backed legislation to allow offshore exploration. Their measure would pursue other ways to expand energy sources, too.

"Now the only thing standing between consumers at the pump and the increased American energy they are demanding is the Democrat leadership in Congress," McConnell said. "We should act and act now."

6)High military tension over Iranian presence on strategic Lebanese peak

Military sources report that Israel has placed its military and air forces on its northern borders on high alert after Iran and Syria ignored Jerusalem’s warning, relayed to Washington, that the continued presence of Iranian, Syrian and Hizballah officers on the strategic Lebanese Sannine peak may spark a military clash.

Monday, July 14, two days ahead of the prisoner swap with Hizballah, Israel’s army spokesmen disclosed that Iranian officers had assumed command of Hizballah’s fighting units.

Our military sources report that the disclosure, which further fueled the cross-border tension, referred to the Iranian officers in command of Hizballah teams atop the 7,800-foot Mt. Sannine peak, whence they can monitor and menace US Sixth Fleet movements in the eastern Mediterranean and Israeli Air Force flights.

Iranian officers have also been attached to Hizballah’s anti-air, surface, and shore-to-ship missile units across Lebanon.

All Israel’s military, police and security contingents are also on the ready in case of trouble flaring immediately after Israel and Hizballah exchange prisoners Wednesday. They estimate that once the exchange is out of the way, Hizballah will unleash a cross-border assault and terrorist action inside Israel, its promised revenge for the killing of their military commander Imad Mughniyeh in Damascus last February for which they blame Israel.

Israel’s restraint against Hamas’ missiles campaign from Gaza, despite repeated threats, has left Hizballah and Tehran unmoved by its warning on Lebanon.

The electrical vibes on the Israel-Lebanese border have not reached Paris or impacted President Nicolas Sarkozy’s drive, encouraged by the Bush administration, to end Bashar Assad’s international isolation and so cut him away from his alliance with Iran and ties with Hizballah.

The very opposite process is racing fast forward in the Middle East. In Lebanon, Syria and Iran are operating in close sync to carve Lebanon up between them and seize strategic locations - fully exploiting the willful blindness of Paris and Washington.