Then, as a sitting president's power begins to evaporate when he becomes a "lame duck" (a great US political term -- I wonder what the equivalent in German is)...
Actually, it is just the same term in German, literally translated: "Lahme Ente". But the term is less common in German politics, mostly, because the backstage politics are more powerful here. Popular candidates are often the victim of party politics, when they start risking the balance of power inside a party. Just take for example Friedrich Merz, who was a raisingstar among German conservatives, but became killed in party politics for his biggest idea, his simplification of the tax system, which even got endorsed by the more conservative people among the political enemies.
Well, you and I shall have to agree to disagree on this one. I readily concede that there are still deep, deep problems in Iraq that have to do with the taboo subject of culture. But the improvement in the basic security situation is massive, not slight, and the Sunni tribal leaders' change in political orientation from supporting al Qaida and the ousted Baathists, and Sadr's loss of power (he's announced he's moving to Iran) are tectonic shifts in the Iraqi political landscape. The Iraqis now have an opportunity because of the surge that they literally have never had in their history.
I would stay careful. What my information on Iraqis domestic politics is, is that the fighting between the dominant shias, the sunnis and the curds is not over yet, or by any means stable. Neither is Iraq save from any Iran intervention.
First, if Palin were to become president and attempted to make some kind of national legal mandate to force the teaching creationism, I would soon go broke from donating to ANYONE who would oppose her.
Well said, by why elect such a person at all,when her political position now already implies that she might require a really powerful opposition, when she could assume power. I always thought, the matter of the VP is only so important in the USA, because it really happened that the VP became president. In Germany, the deputy chancellor is a matter of the coalition building in the parliament, as we have only a very limited separation of power (It should be more in a working democracy, IMHO).
Second, the issue of "drilling in nature preserves" is far more complex than your comment gives credit. As you know from things I've posted here before, a significant element of my law practice deals with technical and engineering aspects of the energy industry. Drilling and production technology today is orders of magnitude safer and cleaner than it was 20 years ago.
The footprint of a drilling operation is minuscule compared to what it was when I first started working in the industry. If you take an inflexible position opposing exploration and production work on protected lands without some technical knowledge about how the work would actually be done, I'm afraid I don't count the opinion as having any real merit.
I think the theoretical improvements are not comparable to the practical implemented improvements. Look at the damage, Shell causes in Alaska in his upstart oil sand project, only for overtaking the company which is already researching oil sand extraction for 20 years. If you don't force and control the companies to be careful, they won't do that.
And it is far easier to damage a natural reservate, than to restore it. In germany, we have some experience with renaturalizing mines or border strips, and in the best case, you can have most damage fixed in ten years with lot's of money invested. Too much to do this more often than as a small experiment. Just not doing anything can also work, in about 50 years, when you have no toxic waste.
Which, in the oil drilling context, is impossible. Small spills happen all the time. If not of oil, than of contaminated water. Also, I remember that off-shore oilrigs also have some very nasty chemicals in use for preventing algae damaging their sub-surface systems.
So, you can drill oil for lowering the local US oil price for about 30 years. But this will very likely cause major damage to the natural reservates, because of direct chemical polution, constructions and traffic. When the oil is gone and you have no alternative, the price will be even higher, and you also have the costs for restoring a natural reservate.
Finally, polar bears are cute. No doubt. I believe Germany recently had a rock star polar bear, or something like that. But the politics of the very specific legal question of including a species on the endangered list is complex. Again, I'd caution against uninformed opinions on the subject.
It is actually not too complex. The definition of endangered does not always mean: Population is already close to extinction by natural events. Saying a species is threatened is mostly a warning for human behavior. And if all african farmers would sue their governments for protecting elephants...instead of just sueing them for the damage caused by elephants, which is more profitable... we would likely have no elephants left. And German fishers would still like shoot a large number of endangered species (beaver, otter, komoran), which they consider "food rivals".
And you should not investigate too closely to the German relationship to new-born animals. We are crazy in that context. Especially if the animal is a dangerous carnivore. We love it when it is small and cute - and become shocked when it starts hunting the trainer. There was a close visual relation between Knut (the polar bear in question) and Elvis Presley last summer... With the exception that the US government stopped paying Elvis after he left the Army.
