ThinkFast: June 8, 2009

After a “nearly unprecedented turnout” by Lebanese voters, the ” American-backed alliance appeared to retain control of the Lebanese Parliament on Sunday,” representing “a significant and unexpected defeat for Hezbollah and its allies, Iran and Syria.” Iran follows with its own presidential election this Friday.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) “admonished the Obama administration on Saturday for proposing cuts to Alaska’s missile defense network,” giving her “strongest public remarks to date on the matter.” “Reducing Alaska’s defense readiness in these perilous times is a show of weakness, it is not a sign of strength,” Palin said at a speech in upstate New York.

A Gallup poll released late last week found that conservatives are now in favor of allowing gay Americans serve openly in the military. Majorities of “weekly churchgoers (60%), conservatives (58%), and Republicans (58%) now favor what essentially equates to repealing the ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ policy.”

North Korea sentenced American journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee to 12 years of hard labor today for “committing hostilities against the Korean nation and illegal entry,” charges that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has called “baseless.” White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton released a statement saying that the Obama administration is “engaged through all possible channels to secure their release.”

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said yesterday on ABC’s This Week that the U.S. “will consider reinstating North Korea to a list of state sponsors of terrorism.” At the same time, however, she acknowledged that there was a legal process for the move. “Obviously we would want to see recent evidence of their support for international terrorism,” Clinton said.

President Obama promised today “to deliver more than 600,000 jobs through his $787 billion stimulus plan this summer, with federal agencies pumping billions into public works projects, schools and summer youth programs.” The administration “had always viewed the summer as a peak for stimulus spending,” but “Obama now promises an accelerated pace of federal spending over the next few months to boost the economy and produce jobs.”

Former Sens. Bob Graham (D-FL) and Jim Talent (R-MO), who currently head a “bipartisan commission on weapons of mass destruction,” sent a letter to OMB Director Peter Orszag yesterday saying that Obama’s plan to finance swine flu vaccine production using the BioSheild Reserve Fund would “severely diminish the nation’s efforts to prepare for WMD events and will leave the nation less, not more, prepared.”

In its first report to Congress, the Wartime Contracting Commission found that “the Defense Department has failed to provide adequate oversight over tens of billions of dollars in contracts to support military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.” The report, which will be released publicly on Wednesday, says that U.S. reliance on private sector employees has grown to “unprecedented proportions.”

In what amounts to an “end-run” around campaign finance laws, lobbyists in 2008 made $35.8 million in payments to charities affiliated with lawmakers and to “honor” lawmakers and other federal officials. The USA Today analysis found that “[m]ost of the money — about $28 million — went to non-profit groups, some with direct ties to members of Congress.” Twice, the donations “came in response to a personal appeal for funds from the lawmaker.”

And finally: Stephen Colbert yesterday taped the first of the four shows he will be doing in Iraq this week, “wearing a business suit made of the same camouflaged material used for soldiers’ desert uniforms.” “It must be nice in Iraq, because some of you keep coming back again and again,” Colbert joked, referring to the multiple tours many soldiers have gone through. During the show, Colbert also received a regulation military haircut, called Gen. Ray Odierno “Shrek,” and “declared himself the only person man enough finally to declare victory in Iraq.”

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