By Louis Maurer

Currier and Ives, 1860

Horace Greeley carries Abraham Lincoln into a Lunatic Asylum as followers of the Republican Party express their positions on various issues. They are saying:

Greeley: "Hold on to me Abe, and we'll go in here by the unanimous consent of the people."

Lincoln: "Now my friends I'm almost in and the millenium is going to begin, so ask what you will and it shall be granted."

Woman: "Oh! what a beautiful man he is. I feel a 'passional attraction' every time I see his lovely face."

Man: "I represent the free love element, and expect to have free license to carry out its principles."

Man: "I want religion abolished, and the book of Mormon made the standard of morality."

African American: "'De white man hab no rights dat cullad pussons am bound to spect.' I want dat understood."

Woman: "I want womans rights confered, and man reduced in subjection to her authority."

Man: "I want everybody to have a share of everybody else's property."

Man: "I want a hotel established by government, where people that aint inclined to work, can board free of expense, and be found in rum and tobacco."

Man: "I want guaranteed to every citizen the right to examine every other citizen's pockets without interruption by Policemen."

Man: "I want all the stations houses burned up, and the M.P.s killed, so that the bohoys can run with the machine and have a muss when they please."

The political crisis in Kiev is a matter of great concern to those who welcome the political progress made since the Orange Revolution. It is vital that this situation is resolved in line with the rule of law and democratic principles consistent with European values, and above all in accordance with the democratically expressed wishes of the Ukrainian people.

We have to accept that the European Union has not done enough to prevent this crisis from developing. Whereas other European countries that made the transition from Soviet rule to democracy benefited from substantial political and material support, Ukraine has been asked to overcome a very difficult political legacy largely on its own.

Because of the Union's internal preoccupations, adequate attention has not been devoted to the task of nurturing and encouraging Ukraine's democratic gains. It is now time for Europe to engage in a more committed and consistent manner.

European leaders must understand and acknowledge the context in which the crisis has arisen. President Viktor Yushchenko acted responsibly by agreeing to share power with his former rival, Viktor Yanukovych, after last year's parliamentary elections produced a stalemate. Unfortunately, Yanukovych has since used the office of prime minister to initiate a self-serving political power grab and has upset the delicate political balance of Ukrainian society.

There is therefore little utility in calling for Ukraine's leaders to reach a sensible internal settlement when one side is unwilling to share power and normal constitutional mechanisms have fallen into disrepair.

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CAIRO, April 19 (UPI) -- Representatives of the Interior and Justice ministries of Arab League nations completed anti-corruption discussions Thursday in Cairo.

Kuwaiti Attorney General Bader Abdullah Al-Musead, who was elected chairman of the meeting, said representatives agreed on a comprehensive anti-corruption draft law that will be sent to Arab Justice and Interior ministries for inspection, KUNA, the Kuwait News Agency, reported Thursday.

Al-Musead said the meeting was aimed at helping Arab countries ensure their anti-corruption measures line up with the U.N. charter on anti-corruption. He said the anti-corruption concerns of Arab nations include stopping the financing of terrorism, money laundering and organized crime.

BUCHAREST (AFP) - The Romanian parliament voted Thursday to suspend President Traian Basescu in a first step to impeaching him, throwing the country into turmoil less than four months after it joined the EU.

Prime Minister Calin Tariceanu, who has been in a long-running feud with the president, said: "I ask Traian Basescu to honour his own decision to resign and cut all ties with the presidency."

The president has said he would resign if parliament voted to suspend him. This would force a new presidential election in which he would stand.

Basescu was accused of 19 constitutional violations, including "controlling through those close to him all state institutions, of interfering in the law and protecting the interests of the mafia in the Romanian economy."

Opposition members also blame him for the country's political crisis, especially through his criticism of Tariceanu and his threats to call legislative elections.

The 55-year-old, who remains a popular figure in Romania and could win back his post, struck a combative note telling thousands of his supporters who had gathered in front of the university: "We will see each other at the polls."

His supporters in turn shouted "Do not resign," and "We love you."

The embattled president said: "I assure you that after my return I will continue to speak openly and tell the truth about the government."

Basescu's close collaborators have said he would announce his resignation after his suspension has been made official, which should occur within 48 hours of the vote.

The leader of the opposition Social Democrats who spearheaded the move against Basescu, Mircea Geoana, said the vote was "a victory for Romanian democracy even if it is a difficult moment."

Opposition members, led by the Social Democrats, say Basescu violated the constitution by acting in a partisan way.

Basescu's impeachment must be approved in a referendum, which must be held within 30 days of Thursday's vote.

A total of 322 members of Romania's 469-seat parliament voted for his suspension, while 108 voted against and 10 abstained. The motion needed the backing of 235 MPs to be adopted.

The three opposition parties that filed the motion against Basescu and which hold 228 parliamentary seats, said they would vote for his impeachment.

MPs from Tariceanu's National Liberal Party and its coalition partner in the minority government also supported the motion after their leaders told them Wednesday to vote as they chose.

Basescu's Democrats, who have 71 seats in parliament, have opposed the impeachment request since it was launched.

Basescu, in power since 2004, has been in a long-running feud with the prime minister who sacked ministers from the president's Democrat party in a government reshuffle several weeks ago.

But the conflict seems to have escalated since Romania joined the

European Union on January 1.

The political crisis has not improved the country's image abroad. EU experts are set to visit next week to assess the country's progress in implementing reforms, especially in the judicial area.

Basescu is the first Romanian president to be suspended since the fall of communism in 1989. In 1994, Ion Iliescu avoided suspension following accusations that he had involved himself in judicial matters.

The Social Democrat head of the senate, Nicolar Vacaroiu, will take over presidential duties until a referendum is held. In the event Basescu resigns, Vacaroiu would fulfil his functions until presidential elections are held in three months' time.

In his Web-only column today, The Times’s Carl Hulse writes about how Republicans, in the effort to reclaim their majority next year, have been loading once mundane opposition motions with all sorts of political bombs, which they are then unleashing in press releases to local newspapers, on a special Web site and – presumably – in future 30-second campaign adds. “To hear Republicans tell it, some of the most politically vulnerable Democrats in the House have cast eye-popping votes in the opening months of their service in Congress,” writes Mr. Hulse. Go to Column.

Here's news guaranteed to tickle anyone who, like me, is both a geek and a presidential-campaign junkie: Yahoo, Slate, and the Huffington Post have announced that they're going to cohost the first-ever online presidential debates during the 2008 campaign. There will be one for Democratic candidates and one for the Republicans, and both will be hosted by Mr. Charlie Rose.

The press release doesn't have a lot of detail, other than that the debates will be held after Labor Day of this year, and that the Democratic one will have opening remarks by DNC Chairman Howard Dean. So I have a few questions. Such as....

Who will participate? ....

Link to Source
http://blogs.pcworld.com/techlog/archives/004194.html

The responses are starting to come in from the Democratic side to Rudy Giuliani's suggestion that the nation will be safer from attack if a Republican is elected to the White House in 2008:

"Rudy Giuliani today has taken the politics of fear to a new low and I believe Americans are ready to reject those kind of politics," Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., says in statement e-mailed to reporters this morning.

The Democratic presidential candidate continues: .............

 

April 26, 2007 — If you were looking for big fireworks or a knockout punch in the first Democratic presidential debate of the 2008 election cycle, you will no doubt be somewhat disappointed tonight. No one candidate seemed to dominate the field.

Though much of the coverage of the race thus far has been through a "Clinton vs. Obama" frame, the front runners were just two of eight candidates on the stage, and each got their chance to make their case. In fact, it was the two most unknown candidates representing the far left wing of the Democratic Party — Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, and former Sen. Mike Gravel, R-Alaska — who created the relatively little heat on the stage.

"And I got to tell you, after standing up with them, some of these people frighten me — they frighten me," said Gravel about his opponents.

Iraq dominated more time than any other single issue, as the presidential hopefuls continued to differentiate themselves on the subject in what have now become familiar ways to the Democratic activists who have been closely following the campaign.

"I am proud that I opposed this war from the start," said Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., before pivoting to his support for a phased withdrawal plan.

"If I knew then what I now know, I would not have voted that way," said Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., in her usual refrain..........

Link to source
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=3086826&page=1

Horserace Journalism: It's been a rough month for some of the presidential front-runners in Iowa, according to new polls of the caucus contests.

Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Edwards saw their support drop. So did Republicans Rudy Giuliani and John McCain. Among the leading contenders, only Democrat Barack Obama made gains.

Republican Mitt Romney, who has been running a good campaign in Iowa, has inched into the top tier of his party's candidates by finishing third. Potential candidate Fred Thompson is close behind.

Link to source

And so Paul Wolfowitz has resigned as head of the World Bank. The resignation was pretty much inevitable- Wolfowitz was dripping blood politically and it was only a question of when he would decide to fall on his sword rather than take another and another blow. Originally the reason for his resignation lay in the fact that his girlfriend, Shaha Riza, had been employed by the Bank and was than transferred lucratively to the state department. Questions were asked about the President's role in her transfer and particularly in her salary deals- and those questions prompted some to suggest that Wolfowitz himself was guilty of corruption.

This came as a significant blow to a President of the Bank who had from the moment he took office prioritised the battle against corruption- the scandal involving Miss Riza looked to be exactly the type of scandal that Mr Wolfowitz would penalise a third world regime for- and therefore the argument that he had to go was strengthened.