Despite widespread reports of abuse and troubling signs of suppressing dissent, the Egyptian military will get their US funding restored, at least in part. The State Department plans to make the announcement today. The United States supplies Egypt with $1.3 billion in military aid, plus another $250 million in economic assistance. Congress included language in [...]

In a reminder that negotiation and diplomacy is a far preferable course to war and belligerence, North Korea, still in flux after the death of Kim Jong-il, has agreed to suspend its nuclear testing and uranium enrichment, as well as an agreement to allow nuclear weapons inspectors back into the country. In exchange, the North [...]

The official rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline from the President has some interesting framing: “As the State Department made clear last month, the rushed and arbitrary deadline insisted on by Congressional Republicans prevented a full assessment of the pipeline’s impact, especially the health and safety of the American people, as well as our environment,” [...]

Before Congress even passed its two-month stopgap payroll tax/UI legislation, the State Department had a warning. The bill included a mandate that the Administration give an up-or-down approval or rejection on a permit for the Keystone XL pipeline within 60 days.  The State Department said flatly that this would force them to reject the permit, [...]

Glenn Greenwald has a follow-up on his story about the murder of Iranian nuclear scientists, and he calls the incidents what they actually are: Terrorism. Part of the problem here is the pretense that Terrorism has some sort of fixed, definitive meaning. It does not. As Professor Remi Brulin has so exhaustively documented, the meaning [...]

OK, they’re not outwardly advocating this. But that’s the practical effect of demanding that the provision on Keystone XL get included in any end of the year deal to extend the payroll tax cut and unemployment insurance. Republicans say they’re not budging on the pipeline. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell “will not support any bill [...]

The House will vote on their payroll tax cut bill today, legislation loaded with ideological measures and poison pills.  It’s legislation Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, has already said cannot pass the upper chamber. Like so many times before, the House believes that they can pass message legislation as long as it contains something [...]

The news that the State Department Inspector General will investigate the process involving State’s environmental impact study on the Keystone XL pipeline that allegedly was the product of a massive conflict of interest throws a significant spanner in the gears moving to get the pipeline approved. With an open investigation, it would simply be difficult [...]

The other day, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney tried to offload the decision on whether to go forward with the Keystone XL pipeline on the State Department. But President Obama himself was asked about the pipeline in a local news interview last night, and he took full responsibility for making the decision. In doing [...]

Darren Goode has a story about the difficulty that environmentalists opposed to the Keystone XL pipeline have had with getting Senate Democrats to help them expose conflicts of interest. Environmental groups opposing the $7 billion, 1,700-mile pipeline sending crude from Alberta oil sands to Texas have uncovered evidence they say shows the State Department has [...]

On a conference call with progressive media, White House deputy national security adviser for strategic communication Ben Rhodes stressed that the United States would now commence a “normal” relationship with the Iraqi government, an equal partnership between two sovereign nations. But it’s hard to square that with the reality that the United States will have [...]