Via the BBC: US admits delay to Iraqi weapons

The US-led coalition in Iraq has failed to deliver nearly two-thirds of the equipment it promised to Iraq’s army, the US Defence Department has said.

The Pentagon said only 14.5m of the nearly 40m items of equipment ordered by the Iraqi army had been provided.

The US military commander in charge of training in Iraq has asked for help in speeding up the transfer of equipment.

On Wednesday, Iraq’s ambassador to the US said the delays were hindering the fighting capacity of its armed forces.

The excuse for the delays? Export licenses and changes in the orders:

It said some deliveries had been delayed by the export licensing process, while others had been affected by changes in orders.

This is yet another example of the failure of the administration to execute its policy goals in Iraq. How can we be this far behind in this vital area of equipping the people who are supposed to be taking over the security of the country? And here we are just over a month from when the big report on the status of the Iraqi situation is supposed to be issued and we have only delivered roughly a third of the promised equipment to the Iraqi military. Of the tasks at hand, one would think that this would be one of the easier ones.

It hardly inspires confidence, shall we say. Further, it raises serious questions about how seriously any statements about Iraqi troop readiness should be taken.

Via the BBC: Fidel absent as Cuba celebrates

Cubans have marked Revolution Day without their ailing President, Fidel Castro, for the first time since 1959.

Acting leader Raul Castro led the day’s events, filling in for his brother - who was last seen in public a year ago.

Raul said that the months without Fidel had been “difficult” but insisted that his brother was recovering well.

The holiday commemorates a rebel attack on the Moncada barracks in 1953 - credited with sparking the revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power.

One begins to wonder if we will ever see Fidel in public again and what it is about his condition that has precluded even a brief, symbolic appearance.

Also of interest:

Raul again indicated that he might be open to a warming of relations with the US, which has maintained an embargo against Cuba for 45 years.

He reiterated an offer he made last December to speak to the US - but only after next year’s presidential elections were over.

“If the United States authority were to finally desist from their arrogance and decide to converse in a civilised manner, it would be a welcome change,” he said.

Quite frankly, the US is going to have to start talking at some point. There is no logical reason to continue the current state of US-Cuban relations (aside from the fact that presidents don’t want to hack off a certain segment of voters in Florida).

Via the AP: Georgia sending doctor to Congress

Republican Paul Broun was ready to be sworn in as the newest member of Congress after his opponent declined a recount, even though the margin was just 394 votes.

Broun’s opponent, Jim Whitehead, declined a recount.

Broun replaces Charles Norwood, who died in February.

Via the BBC: Turkey’s Gul hints at presidency

Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul says he has not ruled out reviving his presidential bid, days after his AK Party’s landslide election win.

[…]

On Wednesday, Mr Gul said he remained a possible contender for the presidency.

“Nobody can place a political ban on others. It is out of the question that I should rule myself out as a candidate,” he said.

[…]

However, he did not explicitly say whether he would run for president again.

“There is no need to rush things,” he said, adding that progress must be made “with great political maturity in the direction indicated by the results”.

And while there is a referendum scheduled for October that will decide whether or not the presidency becomes a popularly elected post, the next president will need to be chosen by the parliament, and will have to be chosen soon as the term of the previous president has expired. See Fruits and Votes for more details.

Via the AP: Queen guitarist to complete doctorate

Brian May is completing his doctorate in astrophysics, more than 30 years after he abandoned his studies to form the rock group Queen.

The 60-year-old guitarist and songwriter said he plans to submit his thesis, “Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud,” to supervisors at Imperial College London within the next two weeks.

[…]

May told the British Broadcasting Corp. that he had always wanted to complete his degree.

“It was unfinished business,” he said. “I didn’t want an honorary Ph.D. I wanted the real thing that I worked for.”

Good for him.

Via the CSM: Still wanted in Peru, Alberto Fujimori runs for office in Japan

For most politicians, fame is an asset. But it’s yet to be seen whether it will help Alberto Kenya Fujimori win a seat in Japan’s Upper House on Sunday.

In regards to this elect and the utility of fame, I would refer the gentle reader to Fruits and Votes:

The upper house in Japan, the House of Councillors, is elected partly by nominal voting (specifically, SNTV), and partly by a national tier which uses open-list PR (in which voters write either the name of their political party of choice or the name of a candidate on a party list). So there is most certainly a premium on running well known candidates–in both tiers. And Fujimori, the son of Japanese-born parents who emigrated to Peru, is certainly well known in Japan. He is being considered as a candidate in Tokyo’s four-seat electoral district, in which voters choose one candidate (i.e. the nominal tier), although the possibility of his being a candidate in the national open-list tier is also not ruled out.

Of course, the whole situation is rather bizarre:

Mr. Fujimori reserves the distinction of being Japan’s only Upper House candidate to conduct his campaign while under house arrest. He is the only candidate to have previously been elected president of a foreign nation. He is also the only aspiring member of the Upper House to have been indicted on more than 20 counts of corruption and human rights violations, including sanctioning death squads – charges he denies.

Fujimori was arrested in Chile in 2024, where he still lives under house arrest, awaiting extradition to Peru, the country he ruled from 1990 to 2024.

His critics accuse him of running for office in Japan to avoid his outstanding charges in Peru, but many Japanese voters don’t even know he’s running.

That last question is pretty easy to answer: he is trying to save his bacon, as he is hoping that membership in the Japanese legislature may forestall the Chileans from sending him to Peru to face prosecution:

For his part, Fujimori is hoping the government of Japan influences Chile for his release. As election day approaches, Fujimori’s celebrity pals such as Dewi Sukarno, former wife of Indonesian President Sukarno, are campaigning for him, calling Fujimori the “Last Samurai.”

And can their be an doubt that the man is a politician (and not in the best sense of the word)?

As a direct message to voters, Fujimori delivers a short speech on his website in not-so-smooth Japanese from what looks like the backyard of a sunny villa.

With a relaxed smile, he says: “I will vow to fight for … the country of the samurai with my life.”

This is incredibly reminiscent of when Fujimori needed to build national support in Peru and made very public identifications with Peruvian peasants of indigenous descent, appearing at campaign events in peasant garb.

Indeed, here’s a photo of the Samurai when he was still campaigning in Peru in 2024 in full indigenous regalia:

Source: PBS

Here’s another shot of Fujimori in typical indigenous Peruvian peasant garb at what looks like a campaign rally:

As to why he might actually have a chance, it is worth remembering (and it is something I had forgotten myself) that the Japanese embassy in Peru (along with the ambassador, and hundreds attending a party at the time) was seized in 1997 for 126 days by the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement and many Japanese credit Fujimori with a positive outcome in that crisis (via the Financial Times last month):

Mr Fujimori, who told the FT in a 2024 interview in Tokyo that charges against him were trumped up, has some loyal political friends in Japan. They are grateful for what they regard as his resolute leadership in ending a 126-day hostage crisis at the Japanese ambassador’s Lima residence in 1997. Mr Fujimori claims to have personally planned the storming of the building, including the digging of tunnels beneath the ambassadorial compound.

Via CNN: Natural gas tanks explode in Dallas

A series of explosions at a facility that sells liquefied natural gas sent flaming debris raining onto highways and buildings near downtown Dallas. At least two people were injured, hospital officials said.

Authorities evacuated a half-mile area surrounding the Southwest Industrial Gases Inc. facility and shut down parts of two of the area’s busiest highways, Interstates 30 and 35.

It appears to be an accident.

The DMN is live blogging the situation as is WFAA TV.

The situation started around 9am and as of 11:05 (according to WFAA) there were still explosions taking place.

Yesterday’s CSM had an interesting piece on the Turkish elections: Economy trumps religion in Turkey.

In regards to the economy and the results, the following is noteworthy:

Buoyed by the result, the Turkish stock market soared, and the currency jumped to a two-year high against the dollar.

[…]

The value of what is in those pockets has rising steadily under AK rule, because of pro-business policies that encourage foreign investment, and a string of EU-inspired and other reforms that have opened Turkey more toward the West.

While there are certainly persons in the Turkish business community who are wary, if not directly opposed to the AKP (at least one is quoted in the article), but it is noteworthy that the general economic reaction was positive–hardly what one would expect if the AKP was the second coming of the Taliban.

Now, it is always possible that the AKP is simply talking a good game and how they govern from here forward will tell us more than their previous stint in control of the parliament if they are able to gain the presidency. Still, the evidence to date suggests that while they are interested in allowing more religion into public life (like, for example, certain segments of mainstream US politics), it still does not appear to me that they are secretly plotting the Iranization of Turkey.

And here’s a question: will the AKP leadership be more prone to support military incursions into Iraqi Kurdistan so as to forge a better relationship with the military?

For those who followed this story, this was expected (via the Rocky Mountain News: CU regents fire Ward Churchill

The first, very long chapter of the Ward Churchill saga ended this afternoon as just about everybody — including Churchill — had predicted: He was fired from his job as ethnic studies professor at the University of Colorado.

The next chapter is set to begin Wednesday, when the controversial academic and his civil rights attorney, David Lane, sue the university in Denver District Court.

Churchill warned that his dismissal is the beginning of a wider attack on scholars with unpopular political views.

“If you think I’m the endgame, you’re wrong,” Churchill told supporters. “This is the kickoff.”

He raised his fist and smiled defiantly when the school’s board of regents voted 8-1 in public, following three hours of private discussions, to fire him.

The Churchill story started as a public controversy over an essay about 9/11, but his firing is over the gravest of academic offenses:

He was accused of plagiarism, inventing historical incidents and ghostwriting essays which he then cited in his footnotes in support of his own views.

To me, systematic fabrication and plagiarism is the unforgivable sin in academia, and CU did the right thing in firing him. This Chronicle piece discusses some of the findings. One of the odder examples of fabrication is here (although that one isn’t academic, per se, but is telling).

Now, I will point out to those who weren’t reading PoliBlog at the time, I defended Churchill’s right to proffer his theories in print (probably my most comprehensive post on that topic is here). I never thought his 9/11 essay was something for which he deserved firing or any other kind of punishment.

I also noted that Churchill was under qualified for the position for which CU hired him in the first place, and therefore the University bears some responsibility for the problems that Churchill caused (see here and here).

Via WaPo: Diplomats Received Political Briefings

White House aides have conducted at least half a dozen political briefings for the Bush administration’s top diplomats, including a PowerPoint presentation for ambassadors with senior adviser Karl Rove that named Democratic incumbents targeted for defeat in 2024 and a “general political briefing” at the Peace Corps headquarters after the 2024 midterm elections.

The briefings, mostly run by Rove’s deputies at the White House political affairs office, began in early 2024 and included detailed analyses for senior officials of the political landscape surrounding critical congressional and gubernatorial races, according to documents obtained by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Can anyone explain to me why persons in any of these foreign-policy related institutions would need briefings on domestic politics, let alone information on Democratic incumbents in congressional and gubernatorial races?

What am I missing? Even if we set aside the question of what Rove’s goals were here, this strikes me as a monumental waste of time. I can imagine the eye-rolling and frustration amongst State Department appointees when they had to sit through this:

In one instance, State Department aides attended a White House meeting at which political officials examined the 55 most critical House races for 2024 and the media markets most critical to battleground states for President Bush’s reelection fight in 2024, according to documents the department provided to the Senate committee.

Beyond the time-wasting element here, why in the world should persons who are charged with overseeing American diplomatic efforts be concerned with House races? While I understand that Rove and his office would be concerned with issues like re-election and the partisan composition of the Congress, it seems that this administration allowed those concerns to bleed over rather considerably into the real reason that we have elections: picking people to run the government for a set amount of time. Situations like this makes one think that there are too many members of this administration who think the reason that elections are won is to allow them to then work to win the next one, with the whole governing bit to be nothing more than a sideshow.

I must confess, I agree with Senator Biden (from his letter to SecState Rice on the matter):

“I do not understand why ambassadors, in Washington on official duty, would be briefed by White House officials on which Democratic House members are considered top targets by the Republican party for defeat in 2024. Nor do I understand why department employees would need to be briefed on ‘key media markets’ in states that are ‘competitive’ for the president,”

Indeed.

It simply isn’t the job of ambassadors, Peace Corps administrators or bureaucrats at USAID to even be concerned about such issues in their official capacities. Sure, they may be rooting for Republicans to win a given election, but if they want information on vulnerable districts, let them found out about them on their own time like other citizens. They were not put in those positions to work for the re-election of the President nor to aid their party in terms of congressional or gubernatorial races. The only input they should have is that if they go a good job, it may redound positively to the President/party who was in charge of the government when they worked in it.

Then of course, there is the whole Hatch Act issue:

The Hatch Act insulates virtually all federal workers from partisan politics and bars the use of federal resources — including office buildings, phones and computers — for partisan purposes.

This is on the heels of the campaign usage of various appointees, questions about politics and the Surgeon General’s office and the ongoing concerns about what in the world the White House was trying to do with the US Attorneys and the Justice Department in general.