In 2003, U.S. diplomatist Peter Galbraith resigned at the end of a distinguished, 24-year government career. Over the years that followed, he worked as a contract-based adviser to leaders in Iraq’s Kurdish community, while also arguing passionately in public media that Iraq’s Kurds should be given maximum independence from Baghdad – including full control over any new sources of oil.
(full article…)

I am innocent of any crime, says Olmert (full article…)

In the period between Election Day last November and the end of June, the groups scheduled 70 fundraisers for members of Congress. Along the way, they made $6 million in federal campaign contributions.

Thirty-five of those 70 wingdings — half! — were thrown by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and its lobbyists. And a third of the money contributed to candidates came from the American Banking Association and affiliated lobbyists. Both organizations are fighting hard to keep the government from clamping down on the financial industry. In fact, the Chamber of Commerce is planning on spending a hundred million bucks to keep the noses of federal snoops out of their business. (full article…)

Take Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., the chairman of the influential Senate Finance Committee, leader of the bipartisan “Gang of Six” spearheading the Finance Committee’s healthcare negotiations, and architect of that committee’s much anticipated healthcare legislation. He’s also one of the top five recipients of health industry-related money in Congress, pocketing $2.9 million in his career. (full article…)

Israel’s second largest bank will be forced to defend itself in court in the coming weeks over claims it is withholding tens of millions of dollars in ‘lost’ accounts belonging to Jews who died in the Nazi death camps. Bank Leumi has denied it holds any such funds despite a parliamentary committee revealing in 2004 that the bank owes at least $75 million to the families of several thousand Holocaust victims. (more…)

History tells us that Washington is quite willing to look the other way when it comes to corruption as long as the crooks under their control do its bidding. Indeed, the very presence of US forces and money is part of the dynamic which encourages such corruption. Apparently, Mr. Karzai is no longer considered to be playing by those rules and attempts to unseat him are growing. (more…)

I was inclined to dismiss his chances, but a longtime Chicago reporter friend told me, “Don’t write him off. He’s a money machine.” (more…)

The current outrage over Bragojevich is certainly warranted, but it is simply an extreme example of something which occurs regularly in American politics: the use of money to curry favors and privilege. The American political institution is awash in millions of wasted dollars.

Bragojevich wanted to sell the Senate seat, but this is already common practice in a sense. Senatorial candidates regularly spend astronomical sums on their campaigns, which usually favor the more profligate of the candidates.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) in Ramallah has blocked access to a popular news website because of the site’s reporting on widespread corruption among the entourage of PA President Mahmoud Abbas.

For several days, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been unable to view the website Donia al-Watan (http://www.alwatanvoice.com) as access has been blocked through the PA-controlled telecom company. Readers outside Palestine and a few inside the country using proxies are still able to access the site.

The Electronic Intifada confirmed that several users attempting to access the website in Ramallah and other parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank could not do so and instead saw a message in English stating “We are sorry, the site was blocked based on attorney General instructions [sic].” (more…)

Prosecutor Brenda Morris, toward the end of her cross-examination of the senator yesterday, settled in for a long discussion about the chair, which Alaska restaurateur Bob Persons bought for Stevens as a gift seven years ago — but which Stevens never reported on his Senate disclosure forms.

“And the chair is still at your house?” Morris asked.

“Yes,” Stevens conceded.

“How is that not a gift?”

“He bought that chair as a gift, but I refused it as a gift,” Stevens explained. “He put it there and said it was my chair. I told him I would not accept it as a gift.”

“Where is that chair now?”

“In our house,” Stevens repeated. “We have lots of things in our house that don’t belong to us, ma’am.”