Here is a clip from a local Anchorage television channel (Channel 2) on Wasilla, Alaska and an interview with a neighbor of the Palins on how life has changed since she was selected.

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Here is news from Latin America.

Bolivia’s Evo Morales Visits Tehran
Evo Morales isn’t doing himself any favours with this state visit to Iran, the first ever by a Bolivian President. The report from Agence France Presse:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told Bolivia’s visiting left-wing President Evo Morales on Monday their two nations are natural allies and would boost energy ties, state media reported.

“The two revolutionary nations and the governments of Iran and Bolivia are natural allies and will boost their relations in the fields of commerce, industry, agriculture, gas, oil and politics,” he told Morales on the first day of a two-day trip to Tehran.

Mexico To Spend $25 Billion on Fuel Subsidies in 2008
Mexico’s government will spend about $25 billion (260 billion pesos) this year on gasoline subsidies to blunt the effect of inflation on consumers, President Felipe Calderon said on Monday. The figure was higher than the $19 billion (200 billion pesos) that the government previously said it would spend on fuel subsidies, which have gotten more expensive this year on higher oil prices. The story from Reuters.

Mexico’s Killing Spree
Mexicans have long been fed up with the escalating violence. But 20 months after conservative President Felipe Calderón launched a massive military effort against drug violence, the bloodshed has only gotten worse. The Christian Science Monitor looks at the drug-fueled violence in Mexico.

Chávez Threatens to Expel US Ambassador
Venezuela’s President Hugo Chávez has certainly stepped up the rhetoric and his arms buying in recent weeks. Fueling Chávez’s anger right now was a US DEA report that drug trafficking via Venezuela has sharply increased in recent years. The story from the New York Times.

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Fox News host of On the Record and Legal Analyst Greta Van Sustern today is asking if the PUMA Movement is real on her Greta Wire blog. I think she is really asking how large it is. So far she has received over 1,700 responses. Here is her post:

Do you think PUMA (”Party Unity My A**) is real? meaning that there are a substantial number of Democrats who are still angry over the Democratic nominee? or do you think the Democratic Party NOW has UNITY? that those originally unhappy with the nominee have now come to terms with the situation and fully support Senator Obama?

Check out the video below (actually above in my post)…and yes, it could be posted by one person…and have no (yes, zero) impact…or it could have the support of some..or even many…what is it? watch and comment..

I am not sure how large the PUMA movement is, certainly it numbers in the tens of thousands in terms of formal members. In terms of the number of who subscribes to the goals of the PUMA cause that number is likely in the hundreds of thousands if not millions. It is a broad based coalition whose principal goal is defeating Senator Obama and demonstrating to the Democratic Party’s leadership that our votes are not to be taken for granted. Some of you might know better than I how large the PUMA movement is. But I’ll venture that Washington high power attorney John Coale, Greta’s husband, is at the very least an honourary PUMA. Mr. Coale, a strong Clinton supporter, today endorsed Senator McCain arguing that Obama is not who he says he is. I concur.

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I have written on this subject before but whenever I see a report on the role of women in Rwandan politics and economic life, I will likely highlighted it because it is a success story born out of a horrible tragedy. Rwanda has the participation of women in politics of any country in the world. In the wake of April 1994 genocide, the country was left with a gender imbalance. More men than women were killed so it was incumbent upon the survivors to step up and play new roles in the country’s life. The women of Rwanda have and they are changing the country in far-reaching but not unexpected ways.

Today 48% of the Rwandan parliament’s members are women and the Constitution now requires at least 30% of the seats be reserved for women. In Rwanda’s 80 seat Chamber of Deputies, 39 are women. This has had far-reaching political consequences because female lawmakers have very different legislative priorities. Rwanda’s investment has increased four-fold in education and health care over the past ten years. Rwanda now spends more per capita on education in sub-Saharan Africa than any other country except for Botswana.

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Just a year in office and with an approval rating of just under 30%, Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda of Japan resigned today. From the New York Times:

Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda announced he would resign on Monday night, abruptly ending his chronically unpopular government after just a year and leaving Japan’s ruling party scrambling to find fresh leadership ahead of crucial national elections.
Mr. Fukuda’s surprise announcement, made at a hastily called news conference on Monday night, stunned Japan and appeared to plunge the world’s second-largest economy into further political confusion. Last year, Mr. Fukuda’s predecessor, the rightist Shinzo Abe, made an equally sudden resignation.

Mr. Fukuda’s decision was particularly unexpected because he took office last September as a veteran political insider widely counted on, after Mr. Abe’s hasty departure, to bring stability and restore the Liberal Democratic Party’s tarnished credibility. In the end, Mr. Fukuda, 72, lasted about as long as Mr. Abe — roughly a year.

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At a press availability in Monroe, Michigan, Barack Obama said: “Back off these kinds of stories.”

“I have said before and I will repeat again: People’s families are off limits,” Obama said. “And people’s children are especially off-limits. This shouldn’t be part of our politics. It has no relevance to Gov. Palin’s performance as a governor or her potential performance as a vice president. So I would strongly urge people to back off these kinds of stories. You know my mother had me when she was 18, and how a family deals with issues and teenage children, that shouldn’t be a topic of our politics.”

On charges that his campaign has stoked the story via liberal blogs:

“I am offended by that statement. There is no evidence at all that any of this involved us,” he said. “Our people were not involved in any way in this, and they will not be. And if I thought there was somebody in my campaign who was involved in something like that, they would be fired.”

He’s right. Children are off-limits.

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From the Chicago Tribune:

The presidential campaign of Sen. John McCain announced Monday that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s teenage daughter is pregnant.

In a statement, Palin and husband Todd said, “Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned. We are proud of Bristol’s decision to have her baby, and even prouder to become grandparents.”

The couple said Bristol, 17, plans to marry the “young man” who is the father of her child. The Reuters news agency reported Monday that Bristol is five months pregnant.

Bristol is the oldest daughter of Gov. Palin’s five children.

The campaign released the statement today to rebut rumor swirling around the internet that Sarah Palin is not really the mother of her youngest child, but that Bristol is the mother of baby Trig, who was born in April. Such rumors, months old here in Alaska, were fueled by the fact that Bristol has appeared at all McCain-Palin campaign events since Friday holding Trig on stage.

McCain knew that Palin’s oldest daughter was pregnant before he tapped Palin to be his running mate, campaign officials said Monday.

“Of course he knew,” one senior campaign official said, adding that there will be no further comment and requesting that the media respect Bristol Palin’s privacy.

Mark Okeson, the assistant principal at Wasilla High School, said Sarah started her junior year there last fall, in the town where Sarah Palin grew up, but Bristol transferred to an Anchorage high school mid-year.

Okeson said Bristol is always an excellent student and popular.
“She was very well respected, very kind to be around,” he said. “She ran lots of circles.”
Okeson learned of the McCain camp’s statement about Bristol’s pregnancy Monday.
“I’m sorry to hear this, but I have every confidence they have the abilities and the confidences handle this,” he said.

“Just like children should not pay for the sins of the parents, the parents should not pay for the transgressions of the children.”

Of course, Obama was born to an 18 year old. And Bristol Palin isn’t running for anything. At 17, she needs to be left alone.

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Yesterday on NBC’s Meet the Press, Tom Brokaw discussed the Palin choice with historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, GOP Strategist Mike Murphy and NBC correspondant Andrea Mitchell. Doris Kearns Goodwin notes that the Vice Presidential pick is important because one-third of Vice Presidents inherit the office. Actually only eight have been “accidental Presidents” that is becoming President after the death or assassination of the President. Nine if you want to count Gerald R. Ford who became President after Nixon’s resignation. Nine out of 43 isn’t even 25%, it’s 20.9% to be precise. Her second point is more relevant that the office now is more important but Constitutionally the office has not changed at all. The Vice President is the President of the Senate awaiting a chance to break a tie. More on Vice Presidents in history see my earlier post on Vice Presidents.

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Fears are mounting in Europe that Russia may restrict natural gas and oil deliveries to Western Europe over coming days, in response to the threat of EU sanctions and NATO naval actions in the Black Sea. While any such move would be a dramatic escalation of the Georgia crisis and play havoc with the oil markets, Russia this past week secured the cooperation of Kahzakstan in preparation for such a move.

Reports have begun to circulate in Moscow that Russian oil companies are under orders from the Kremlin to prepare for a supply cut to Germany and Poland through the Druzhba (Friendship) pipeline. It is believed that executives from lead-producer LUKoil have been put on weekend alert.

“They have been told to be ready to cut off supplies as soon as Monday,” claimed a high-level business source, speaking to The Daily Telegraph. Any move would be timed to coincide with an emergency EU summit in Brussels, where possible sanctions against Russia are on the agenda.

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Desperation Mounts in Bihar
The Indian army and navy stepped up efforts on Monday to rescue hundreds of thousands of people marooned by floods and facing severe shortages of food in the east of the country. The story from Reuters and from the The Hindu.

Religious Violence in Orissa
For a week now, religious violence has beset the eastern Indian state of Orissa. This outbreak of violence is between Christians and Hindus. Churchs, schools and covents under attack and with thousands fleeing their homes for the safety of the forests. More from the Times of India. Whereas in western India, communal violence generally pits Muslim and Hindu, in eastern India communal violence is largely a Christian-Hindu divide.

Jammu Returning to Normal
It’s been a rough month in India with floods and unrest but in Jammu (a part of Kashimir) life seems to be returning to normal after two months of tension and unrest. More from the Times of India.

Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers In Retreat But Still A Force
Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers, watching their fiefdom in the north shrink under daily army attacks, showed by last week’s air raid on a naval base they still pose a military threat, defense analysts said. More from Bloomberg News.

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