Venezuela and Colombia break diplomatic relations

News from Caracas that Venezuela will withdraw its ambassador from Colombia and "freeze relations" with its neighbor should be no surprise to U.S. residents and can even be seen as reassuring. The cantankerous disagreements between Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and former U.S. President George W. Bush reflected badly on the conduct of U.S. foreign policy, given how well Chavez seemed to get along with others. Now, the Bush administration looks a lot better. Tensions began rising Monday between Venezuela and Colombia, a staunch U.S. ally, over Bogota's announcement that it had found weapons in the hands of Marxist rebels that had originally been purchased by Venezuela. "I've ordered to withdraw our ambassador from Bogota, to withdraw our diplomatic personnel," Chavez said in a televised Cabinet meeting, according to the Reuters international news service. "We will freeze relations with Colombia." Colombia's government has been battling FARC insurgents since the 1960s. Colombian Vice President Francisco Santos said his government would investigate how the antitank weapons got to FARC but had no comment on the severing of diplomatic relations with Venezuela, Reuters said. Chavez called allegations that his country sold the antitank missiles to FARC a "big manipulation," Reuters said, and said Venezuela would import farm products from other countries. Venezuela and Colombia have a recent history of sour diplomatic relations despite billions of dollars in trade annually. According to Reuters, Chavez believes Colombia's invitation to host U.S. troops to fight drug trafficking is a threat to his government. But Chavez also needed to bolster his popularity, which has suffered in the past year as falling oil price crimped government spending, Reuters said. In 2008, the two countries massed troops along their long border after Colombia bombed a rebel camp in Ecuador.

United States shouldn't threaten war unless it means it

Was U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton serious today when she warned Iran that it would not permitted to possess nuclear weapons or even produce nuclear fuel for power plants? Did she really mean to threaten war against the Shiite country that had regarded Washington with emnity since the 1979 revolution that overthrew a U.S.-backed ruler who had imposed a monarchy on Iran? That's certainly what it sounded like Sunday when she told Iran's leaders on NBC's "Meet The Press" television show that the country's efforts to develop nuclear weapons was "futile" and said the United States would not permit Tehran to produce its own nuclear fuel, according to the New York Times. "We’re trying to affect the internal calculus of the Iranian regime,” Clinton said. "What we want to do is to send a message to whoever is making these decisions that if you’re pursuing nuclear weapons for the purpose of intimidating, of projecting your power, we’re not going to let that happen.” Well, if something sounds like a threat, looks like a threat and feels like a threat, it's reasonably certain that it's a threat. Is the United States really going to attack Iran, or enlist its allies to, if Tehran continues defying international economic and diplomatic sanctions aimed at bringing an end to its nuclear research? For its part, the rest of the Obama administration immediately began backing away from Clinton's most-threatening comments. Senior officials said Clinton was offering her own opinion but also agreed with her statement that the United States was committed to defending its allies in the region, which presumably include Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Iraq, and Turkey. “You have a right to pursue the peaceful use of civil, nuclear power,” Clinton said as if speaking to Iran's leaders. “You do not have a right to obtain a nuclear weapon. You do not have the right to have the full enrichment and reprocessing cycle under your control." But what if Iran continues to ignore the international community's demands, what then?

Revelations about Bush government keep on coming

Yesterday's news from New York that Bush advisers discussed using U.S. soldiers to arrest a group of terror suspects in a suburb of Buffalo, on Lake Erie near the border with Canada, underscores the risk posed to the United States by its own self-righteous leaders. It's painfully obviously now that the Bush administration was so panicked by the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington that it was willing to throw out more than 200 years of Constitutional experience and tradition as part of its poorly considered response. According to the New York Times, Vice President Dick Cheney and other high-ranking officials, including now-infamous Justice Department attorney John Woo, advised then-President George W. Bush in 2002 that he had the authority to use U.S. troops on U.S. soil without the express authorization of Congress. U.S. troops have not been used domestically in a law enforcement capacity since the Civil War, and their use in that capacity is generally considered barred under the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, the Times said. Woo is the Justice Department lawyer whose memorandums were used to justify the use of brutal interrogation techniques on suspect al-Qaida operatives from 2002-2005. To their credit, opposition to the proposal came from within the administration by then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, National Security Council attorney John Bellinger, FBI Director Robert Mueller, Justice Department official Michael Chertoff and others. “Frankly, it was a bit of a turf war,” a former senior official told the Times. “For a number of people, crossing the line of having intelligence or military activities inside the United States was not worth the risk.” Bush eventually ordered the FBI to make the arrests of the Lackawanna Six, a group of Yemeni Americans who had been communicating with al-Qaida. The six pleaded guilty to terror-related charges in the first domestic terrorism case following the Sept. 11 attacks. Other unnamed former Bush administration officials opposed the use of troops, the Times said. “What would it look like to have the American military go into an American town and knock on people’s door?” another former official said during the internal debate. The Times said Bush was regularly briefed on the Lackawanna case by Muller and CIA Director George Tenet. If the new Obama government is sincere about wanting to avoid a full-blown investigation of the Bush years, some serious voluntary truth-telling is going to have to begin. Let's start with you, Mr. Cheney.

From Russia with love?

Was Russian President Dmitiri Medvedev sending a peace message to Washington as one of his top diplomats threatened economic sanctions against companies that sell weapons to Georgia? In a television interview broadcast Sunday, after U.S. President Joe Biden's visit to former Soviet republics Georgia and Ukraine, Medvedev referred to both states as independent "countries," according to the New York Times, even though Russia has vociferously opposed their efforts to join the Western alliance. Medvedev acknowledged his country's desire for "normal, working, friendly relations with the United States -- mutually beneficial relations" in the interview with Russian television station NTV, the Times said. On Friday, just as Biden returned from a visit to Georgia and Ukraine, Dmitri Rogozin, Russia's envoy to NATO, said Medvedev had decreed that sanctions would be imposed on any company that helped the two former Soviet republics rebuild their military arsenals. Georgia's armed forces were routed last year in a brief war with Russia over two provinces that broke away from Tblisi. Many observers speculated at the time that Russia's anger over the two country's bids for NATO membership was actually the reason for the war. Of course, Biden did not specifically promise military aid, even though such an arrangement would seem logical, but assured Georgia and Ukraine that the United States would not abandon them if it got friendlier with Russia, the Times said. Adding to the drama, a U.S. State Department spokesman said Thursday that the United States was committed to upgrading the Georgian military to NATO standards, the Times said. So it seems that Medvedev was trying to defuse the obvious friction when he told NTV that better relations between Russia and the United States would not cause "deterioration of our ties with other countries or of U.S. relations with some other countries, including Ukraine and Georgia.” Then again, Medvedev did not explain why Moscow has not withdrawn its troops from Georgian territory as required by the accord that ended last year's war.

Annual meeting of Asian nations could see progress on North Korea

Nations concerned about North Korea's continuing refusal to give up its nuclear weapons program hope Thursday's scheduled address by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the ASEAN Regional Forum will help break the frustrating stalemate. The annual security meeting, which is expected to be attended by high-ranking officials from Asian and European countries, also is expected to focus on the behavior of the military junta ruling Myanmar, according to the Reuters international news service. Clinton is expected to be sharply critical of Pyongyang's activities, which has included an underground nuclear detonation and a series of ballistic missile tests in the past year. "Full normalization of relations, a permanent peace regime, and significant energy and economic assistance are all possible in the context of full and verifiable denuclearization," Clinton is expected to say at the meeting, according to a summary of her planned remarks, Reuters said. "North Korea's ongoing threatening behavior does not inspire trust, nor does it permit us to sit idly by." But Clinton has not given any indication that she expects a breakthrough in dealings with Pyongyang, which has refused to budget despite offers of billions of dollars in aid by the West and the imposition of escalating U.N. economic sanctions. During last year's election in South Korea, South Korean President Lee Myung-bak said Seoul was willing to set up a $40 billion investment fund, equal to twice Pyongyang's yearly economic output, if North Korea gave up its nuclear weapons. On Myanmar, formerly Burma, Clinton raised concerns this week that the military government was sharing nuclear technology with North Korea. For its part, a top North Korean official said Pyongyang would not stand for being repeatedly criticized at the meeting and has reportedly downgraded its representation to lower-level diplomats, Reuters said.

Dealership closure decisions prompt Congressional investigation

The extraordinarily complex undertaking that is the restructuring of the U.S. automobile industry was in full view today when a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee opened hearings on dealership shutdowns negotiated by General Motors, Chrysler and the Obama administration. At issue is both the thinking behind the decisions to close more than 3,000 dealerships and a pending bill that could reverse all or many of those decisions, according to Cable News Network (CNN). The head of the administration's Task Force for the Auto Industry, Ron Bloom, a former investment banker, testified today that the closures were critical to the restructuring effort, CNN said. But some members of the subcommittee have objected to some of the individual shutdowns and raised the specter of unfairness or worse. "They had a criteria, but I don't know what their criteria was, what the data was," said Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tennessee), according to CNN. "Some were profitable, and there's even concern that there might even be others open in areas where they closed them." Given the unfortunate tendency of Washington politicians to speak in semitruths, it is difficult to tell whether the Congressional concerns are legitimate or just part of seemingly relentless Republican Party efforts to discredit the administration. Indeed, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), said his concerns included some of the closures but went beyond them to the future of the U.S. economic system. "Every day, I guess I get a little more concerned about what the administration is doing in regard to the GM and Chrysler bankruptcies," he said. "It seems to me that literally the administration is declaring war on capitalism." Rep. Dan Maffei (D-New York), who authored the bill, said he was concerned about the owners of the dealerships that were ordered to close. "It's really an issue of fairness and whether these dealers, given that they've got these big taxpayer-paid-for bailouts for GM and Chrysler, whether the dealers who employ 50 people each on average and are big parts of local communities, shouldn't have some sort of say over how these dealer networks are going to be reorganized," Mattei said, according to CNN. "We felt it was not fair for these dealers, given that the bankruptcy was negotiated in part by the federal government and with federal money, that the dealers would have to not be able to have their rights." Not all dealerships forced to close were left with nothing, CNN said. GM offered its franchises up to $1 million in closing payments and gave them over a year to sell their inventories. GM also reversed dozens of closing decisions after dealers appealed to the company. But Chrysler didn't offer any payments, forced dealerships to shut down within three weeks and had no appeal process.

House panel to investigate effort to conceal secret CIA program

From Washington, D.C., comes word that the House Intelligence Committee has decided to formally investigate the Bush White House's effort to conceal from Congress the existence of a secret counterterrorism program. The program, which is so secret that its purpose has still not been revealed even as controversy about it roils the U.S. Capitol, was made public last month in a briefing by Obama CIA Director Leon Panetta, according to Cable News Network (CNN). Panetta said he had ended the program as soon as he found out about it, and that he understood that the CIA withheld information about it from Congress under orders from former Vice President Dick Cheney. In a statement released today, the intelligence committee's chairman, Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas) said the probe was intended to find out if information was deliberately withheld from Congress in violation of federal law. "I intend to make this investigation fair and thorough," the statement said, "and it is my goal that it will not become a distraction of the men and women of the CIA. However, in order to assist them fully and keep them well-resources, it is the responsibility of the executive branch to ensure that the committee is kept fully and currently informed of all anticipated intelligence activities. The CIA said Thursday that the program was never fully implemented and was not a significant part of the country's efforts to battle al-Qaida and other violent extremists, CNN said.