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July
Don’t get caught flat-footed in front of the press! Below is a quick rundown of today’s “must reads.” – John T. Doolittle, House Republican Conference Secretary
The Morning Murmur –
Monday, July 24, 2006
1. Rice Makes Unannounced Visit to Beirut - Washington Post
Condoleezza Rice made an unannounced stop in Beirut Monday in an effort to
shore up Lebanon's fragile government. The visit is designed in part to show
support for the Lebanon's government, the first anti-Syrian regime in years,
and also to determine what Lebanon needs to get control over its southern
region.
2. Illegals? Not In These Towns - TIME
Fed up with congressional talk and the lack of national legislation, cities
across the U.S. are passing local laws to deter illegal immigrants from
coming to town.
3. A Refreshing Approach to Mideast Crisis - RealClear Politics
This Middle East crisis is different from all other Middle East crises. In the
past, after the violence began the cry would go up: Let the cycle of
violence end, let Israel give up land that it has occupied in return for
peace. This time, land for peace is a non-solution.
4. Cuba drills for oil off Florida - Washington Times
Cuba is drilling for oil 60 miles off the coast of Florida with help from
China, Canada and Spain even as Congress struggles to end years of deadlock
over drilling for what could be a treasure trove of offshore oil and gas.
5. Wexler falls into a comedic interviewer's trap -- and he's not laughing - Palm Beach Post
Rep. Wexler thought he knew
what he was getting into when he sat down with comedian Stephen Colbert -
but really he didn't. He found himself being cajoled into staring at the
camera and saying, "I enjoy cocaine because it's a fun thing to do."
For previous issues of the Morning Murmur, go to www.GOPsecretary.gov
FULL ARTICLES BELOW:
1. Rice Makes Unannounced Visit to Beirut
- Washington Post
By Robin Wright and Fred Barbash
Monday, July 24, 2006; 8:02 AM
BEIRUT, July 24 -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made an unannounced
stop in Beirut Monday in an effort to shore up Lebanon's fragile government,
beleaguered by nearly two weeks of relentless bombing raids that have
wrecked much of the country's infrastructure and sent thousands of Lebanese
citizens fleeing for their lives.
Because the Israeli raids have damaged Beirut's airport, Rice's official
plane landed in Cyprus and she helicoptered with aides and reporters from
there to Beirut, reversing the journey made by thousands of Americans who
have fled Lebanon over the past ten days.
After meeting with Lebanon's Prime Minister Foaud Sinoria, Rice planned on
speaking with politicians from several of Lebanon's sects, including a
Shiite cabinet minister.
The visit is designed in part to show support for the Lebanon's government,
the first anti-Syrian regime in years, and also to determine what Lebanon
needs to support itself and possibly get control over its southern region,
now used by Hezbollah to fire rockets into Israel.
"If they could control the country, we would not be in this situation. The
status quo has never been stable," said a senior official accompanying Rice.
Sinoria greeted Rice with a kiss on both cheeks. Rice told him, "Thank you
for your courage and steadfastness."
He told Rice he was happy to have her in Lebanon, adding his desire to "put
an end to the war that is being inflicted on Lebanon."
After her meetings in Beirut, Rice will return to Cyprus and fly, as
announced, to Israel.
The Bush Administration has been under increasing pressure from Arab regimes
calling for an immediate cease-fire.
On the flight from Washington, Rice told reporters she that wanted a "urgent
cease-fire" but that it had to be one that "lasted" and could not spark
renewed crisis a few weeks down the road.
Rice dismissed calls for the U.S. to engaged with Syria in order to resolve
the current crisis, noting that her predecessor, Colin Powell, had done that
only to be rebuffed.
In Israel Monday, an Israeli attack helicopter crashed on its way back from
a mission in Lebanon, according to a government spokesman. The fate of the
two men on board was unknown.
Fierce fighting raged as Israeli troops moved deeper into Lebanon to besiege
Bint Jbail, dubbed the "capital of the resistance" due to its intense
support of Hezbollah during Israel's 1982-2000 occupation of the south, wire
services said.
Israeli artillery barrages sent plumes of smoke into the air and the
military said soldiers took control of the area around Bint Jbail but did
not capture the town, about 2 1/2 miles from the border.
Ten Israeli soldiers were wounded in the attack, the military said.
Fred Barbash reported from Washington. Jonathan Finer contributed to this
story from Israel.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/24/AR2006072400050.html
2. Illegals? Not In These Towns - TIME
By SARAH LILLEYMAN
The old adage says all politics is local. Right now all legislation on
illegal immigration certainly seems to be. In Washington, the House and
Senate appear no closer to resolving their impasse on the issue. In
competing series of hearings, Senators are insisting on a guest-worker plan,
while hard-liners in the House refuse to accept any such accommodation. Fed
up with all that congressional talk and the lack of national legislation,
cities across the U.S. are passing local laws to deter illegal immigrants
from coming to town. An ordinance will go into effect this week in Vista,
Calif.--a San Diego suburb--that requires employers to register with the
city before using day laborers, many of whom are illegal immigrants. They
must also report whom they hire. The coal town of Hazleton, Pa. (pop.
31,000), is preparing to carry out the nation's toughest illegal-immigration
law, passed two weeks ago. Hazleton's new regulations mandate fines for
employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants and landlords who knowingly
rent to them. "Our quality of life is at stake, and I'm not going to sit
back and wait for the Federal Government to do something about it," says
Mayor Louis Barletta. "I know that other cities across the country feel the
same way."
Those cities include Avon Park, Fla., a Citrus Belt community of 8,500 that
may pass legislation similar to Hazleton's this week. Kennewick, Wash., will
consider an illegal-immigration ordinance this week too. "The government's
not doing enough," says Kennewick councilman Bob Parks, the measure's
sponsor, who points to Barletta as his inspiration. "I thought, If this
mayor has the guts to do this, I'm going to follow suit."
Funny that Parks should choose the word suit. That's exactly what opponents
of such measures are planning. The Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education
Fund expects to file a lawsuit shortly to overturn Hazleton's ordinance,
which Cesar Perales, president of the New York City--based advocacy group,
says is "unconstitutional and discriminatory." Perales cites a legal
analysis by the bipartisan Congressional Research Service that suggests
Hazleton's ordinance, by creating penalties for those who aid immigrants,
may be trampling on an area of law that is under federal jurisdiction. "You
can't have every little town deciding the conditions under which illegal
immigrants are going to live there," he says. For now, at least, some
communities seem determined to try.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1218055,00.html
3. A Refreshing Approach to Mideast
Crisis - RealClear Politics
By Michael Barone
This Middle East crisis is different from all other Middle East crises. Over
the years, since the Six-Day War of 1967, the United States and other
onlookers have gotten used to a certain kind of Middle East crisis.
Palestinians or their sympathizers would threaten and wreak violence against
Israel. Israel would respond, sometimes locally, sometimes by major actions
like the defensive War of 1973 or the occupation of southern Lebanon in
1982. The cry would go up: Let the cycle of violence end, let Israel give up
land that it has occupied in return for peace.
On occasion, with established states whose leaders decided they had no
interest in continuing violence, the recommended solution would work. Anwar
Sadat of Egypt, the one nation whose giant demographic size made it an
existential threat to Israel, decided to go to Jerusalem and then to Camp
David where, under the tutelage of Jimmy Carter, he and Israel's Menachem
Begin made what has turned out to be a cold peace. The late King Hussein of
Jordan, threatened by Palestinian terrorists himself, dealt quietly with
Israel and, in time, made a formal peace as well. Sadat and Hussein, and
their successors, never really wanted to destroy Israel. So they made peace.
The formula of land for peace has not worked as well with others. Bill
Clinton devoted much of his vast psychic energy and negotiating skill to
making a land-for-peace deal between first Yitzhak Rabin and then Ehud Barak
of Israel, and Yasir Arafat of the PLO. In 2000, he got Barak to offer
Arafat the lion's share of the West Bank and Gaza in return for peace.
Arafat refused and launched the Second Intifada instead. Rabin and Barak,
both distinguished military leaders, imagined that Arafat wanted land enough
to make peace. But Arafat preferred the armed struggle that left him in
control of Palestinian Authority funds. He encouraged the Palestinian people
to continue to lust after the destruction of Israel.
Today, almost no one is demanding a land-for-peace deal. The reason is
obvious. Israel left the Gaza strip last year, and the Palestinians there,
instead of observing a cold peace, began launching missiles into Israel and
elected a Hamas government that seeks Israel's destruction. Now, Hamas
forces have killed and kidnapped Israeli soldiers. Similarly, Israel left
southern Lebanon to the tender mercies of Iran-supported Hezbollah fully six
years ago. But Hezbollah, urged on by the Iranian mullahs who want to
deflect attention from their nuclear program, has lobbed missiles into Haifa
and attacked Israeli soldiers.
No government can be expected to ignore such armed attacks on its people and
its military forces. Land-for-peace is a non-starter. Hamas and Hezbollah
already have land. And they have made it clear that they will never
willingly make peace.
The Iranian support for Hamas and Hezbollah has also prompted leaders of
other Arab nations to respond differently than they have in Middle East
crises in the past. Then, they were content to give verbal support to the
likes of Arafat, to please the "Arab street" and the intellectuals in their
own countries. Arafat and his ilk posed no real threat to them. But they
have responded very differently to this crisis, which appears to be an
attempt by the Iranian mullahs to project their influence throughout the
region. Iran, with its missiles and its nuclear program, with its non-Arab
ethnicity and militant Shiite Islam, is a threat to the rulers of countries
like Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt. Hence their denunciations of the
Hezbollah attacks.
The guiding impulse of most leaders in Europe and of many in the United
States is to seek some sort of negotiated compromise. That is what Bill
Clinton did when Hezbollah attacked Israel 10 years ago, and he sent
Secretary of State Warren Christopher to negotiate with President Hafez
Assad of Syria. But today, even the Europeans recognize that this approach
is not only futile, but dangerous. Syria is a cat's-paw of Iran, and Iran,
with its missiles and possible warheads, is an existential threat not only
to others in the Middle East, but to Europe. Appeasement is possible when
the attacker stands ready to be appeased, as Sadat and King Hussein were. It
is dangerous where there is no such willingness, as seems to be the case for
Iran's mullahs and its batty, Holocaust-denying president.
The question now is whether Israel has the capacity and the will to
eliminate the aggressive capability of Hezbollah and Hamas. And whether the
United States has the nerve to continue to back Israel in its determination
to do so. The outcome is not clear. But at least there is no cry for the
non-solution of land for peace.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/07/the_nonsolution_of_land_for_pe.html
4. Cuba drills for oil off Florida -
Washington Times
By Patrice Hill
Published July 24, 2006
Cuba is drilling for oil 60 miles off the coast of Florida with help from
China, Canada and Spain even as Congress struggles to end years of deadlock
over drilling for what could be a treasure trove of offshore oil and gas.
Republicans in Congress have tried repeatedly in the past decade to open up
the outer continental shelf to exploration, and Florida's waters hold some
of the most promising prospects for major energy finds. Their efforts have
been frustrated by opposition from Florida, California and
environmental-minded legislators from both parties.
Florida's powerful tourism and booming real estate industries fear that oil
spills could cost them business. Lawmakers from the state are so adamantly
opposed to drilling that they have bid to extend the national ban on
drilling activity from 100 miles to as far as 250 miles offshore,
encompassing the island of Cuba.
Cuba is exploring in its half of the 90-mile-wide Straits of Florida within
the internationally recognized boundary as well as in deep-water areas of
the Gulf of Mexico. The impoverished communist nation is eager to receive
any economic boost that would come from a major oil find.
"They think there's a lot of oil out there. We'll see," said Fadi Kabboul, a
Venezuelan energy minister. He noted that the oil fields Cuba is plumbing do
not respect national borders. Any oil Cuba finds and extracts could siphon
off fuel that otherwise would be available to drillers off the Florida coast
and oil-thirsty Americans.
Canadian companies Sherritt International Co. and Pebercan Inc. already are
pumping more than 19,000 barrels of crude each day from the Santa Cruz,
Puerto Escondido, Canasi and other offshore fields in the straits about 90
miles from Key West, and Spain's Repsol oil company has announced the
discovery of "quality oil" in deep-water areas of the same region, the
National Ocean Industries Association said.
Cuba's state oil company, Cubapetroleo, also has inked a deal with China's
Sinopec to explore for oil, and it is using Chinese-made drilling equipment
to conduct the exploration.
That compounds the frustration for U.S. oil companies and other businesses
that have lobbied to open up the estimated 45 billion barrels in oil
reserves and 232 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves in banned drilling
areas of the Gulf -- enough to fuel millions of cars and heat millions of
homes for decades.
U.S. companies, which have the best deep-water equipment, cannot participate
in the Cuban drilling because of the 45-year economic embargo against Fidel
Castro's communist regime.
If oil is found in commercially viable quantities, Cuba could be transformed
from an oil importer into an exporter, ending chronic energy shortages on
the island and generating government revenue.
That prospect and the involvement of China and Venezuela in exploration
activities have attracted the attention of the CIA and other national
security agencies, even if congressional opposition to offshore drilling has
not budged.
Sterling Burnett, a fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis, a
conservative think tank, said Cuba's activities show that the
quarter-century ban on offshore drilling is putting the U.S. at a strategic
disadvantage at a time of increasingly scarce energy resources and record
high oil and gas prices that are hampering economic growth and stoking
inflation.
"Canada and even economically backward Cuba are moving forward with plans to
drill in offshore areas that abut U.S. coastal waters," he said. "Since
pools of oil do not respect international boundaries, it is almost certainly
true that Canada and Cuba will be accessing oil that could otherwise be
developed by and for the benefit of Americans."
More than half of the nation's untapped offshore oil and gas reserves lie
within the Gulf, much of it within Florida's protected waters. In the latest
attempt to exploit the reserves, the House last month passed a bill that
would allow coastal states to decide whether to open the first 100 miles of
their waters for exploration.
The bill allows states such as Florida and California to vote for a
permanent moratorium on drilling but also includes a powerful enticement to
allow exploration: half of the hundreds of billions of dollars in royalties
and fees from drilling that otherwise would go to the federal government.
The bill's authors are calculating that the public will support drilling
more when people are able to share in the revenues. That is the case in
Alaska, for example, where drilling faces little opposition because each
resident receives a prorated check for thousands of dollars in oil royalties
each year.
Although coastal states stand to benefit greatly from the revenue-sharing
provision, the Office of Management and Budget said the drain on federal
revenues would amount to hundreds of billions of dollars.
The White House particularly objected to extending the revenue-sharing
provision to Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi and Alabama, which already allow
drilling offshore, and said revenue should be shared only in new drilling
areas.
A bill that the Senate is scheduled to debate this week is far narrower in
an attempt to attract Democratic votes. It focuses on allowing drilling in a
key area in the eastern Gulf thought to contain large reserves, while
ensuring that Florida still enjoys a 125-mile no-drilling buffer zone.
The Senate bill's more targeted revenue-sharing provision would authorize
states that already allow drilling to start earning a one-third share of
royalties in 2017. The provision was added to attract support from Sen. Mary
L. Landrieu, Louisiana Democrat.
http://washingtontimes.com/business/20060724-122242-7824r.htm
5. Wexler falls into a comedic
interviewer's trap -- and he's not laughing - Palm Beach Post
By Brian E. Crowley
Palm Beach Post Political Editor
Saturday, July 22, 2006
U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler has sat in front of some of the hottest television
lights in the world of news talk, barking about political rivals, demanding
action and mostly holding his own in on-air squabbles.
Then he sat down with comedian Stephen Colbert.
Wexler thought he knew what he was getting into - but really he didn't.
He found himself talking about whether caribou meat should be used to fuel
sport utility vehicles. And he found himself being cajoled into staring at
the camera and saying, "I enjoy cocaine because it's a fun thing to do," in
a segment that aired Thursday night.
Welcome to Comedy Central, congressman. Those tough political crowds in Boca
Raton have nothing on the sharp wit of Colbert and the editing skills of the
staff on his popular comedy show, The Colbert Report.
When the cable TV show's producers contacted Wexler's Capitol Hill office to
ask if the Democrat would be interested in appearing, his young staffers
went crazy. All fans of the show, they persuaded a somewhat reluctant Wexler
to do it.
So three weeks ago, Wexler gamely walked to an office on the hill that the
show was using to tape the program. Someone stuck a Florida flag behind
Wexler so Colbert could pretend the interview was taking place in his
congressional office.
The taping lasted 90 minutes, which the producers artfully trimmed and
rearranged for five minutes of the best comic effect.
The show, which airs at 11:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday, is political
satire, a takeoff on shows such as Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor.
After poking fun at the "fighting 19th" Congressional District, Colbert
introduced Wexler with the question, "Which well-tanned politician has the
SPF to represent this district?"
Throughout the taping, Wexler - like all of Colbert's subjects - was forced
into the role of straight man. Asked about the show Friday, the normally
exuberant Wexler seemed a bit subdued after watching it Thursday night.
"I had never seen the show," he said. "Many of the people in the office love
the show, and they said it would be fantastic."
His verdict? "Not my cup of tea."
Which really is the point of Colbert's recurring segment on congressional
districts - making a member of Congress uncomfortable. When Orlando
Republican John Mica appeared, Colbert asked whether he had trouble getting
his rumored toupee through airport security. Massachusetts Democrat Barney
Frank, who is gay, reportedly was seething after Colbert asked him what it
was like to be "an openly left-handed" American.
So as Wexler sat watching the show with his 17-year-old daughter and
13-year-old son, he cringed. At one point, Colbert asked Wexler about
drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Colbert: "Should we drill in ANWR?"
Wexler: "No, no."
C: "So caribou are more important than my SUV?"
W: "No, no."
C: "That's what you just said."
W: "What's most important is that your SUV be required to have better
efficiency in the future."
C: "What if I could make it run on caribou meat? Would you be in favor of
that?"
W: "On caribou meat?"
C: "Or hide - it doesn't matter - or bone?"
W: "Probably not."
Then, because Wexler has no opponent this year, Colbert - saying "this is
just kidding" - egged him on to "say a few things that would really lose the
election for you if you were contested." Colbert neatly hemmed him in by
telling him to complete this sentence: "I enjoy cocaine because... "
And for Comedy Central, here's the money shot: Wexler squirming but looking
straight ahead and playing along by saying, "I enjoy cocaine because it's a
fun thing to do." Followed by, again at Colbert's suggestion: "I enjoy the
company of prostitutes for the following reasons because it's a fun thing to
do. If you combine the two together, it's probably even more fun."
Colbert wrapped up soon after, joking "there is no amount of damage control"
that Wexler would be able to do now.
So what did Wexler's kids think of his performance?
"They thought I was foolish."
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/nation/epaper/2006/07/22/m1a_wexler_0722.html?cxtype=rss&cxsvc=7&cxcat=0
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