What Caught My Eye Today

Iraq - President Bush, defending an unpopular war, ordered gradual reductions in U.S. forces in Iraq, but firmly rejected calls to end the war, saying the insurgents who threaten Iraq's future are a danger to U.S. national security. American troops must stay in the battle, Bush said, and more than 130,000 will remain after the newly ordered withdrawals are completed in July. Bush said 5,700 U.S. forces would be home by Christmas and that four brigades — at least 21,500 troops — would return by July, along with an undetermined number of support forces. Now at its highest level of the war, the U.S. troop strength stands at 168,000. Bush said the U.S. engagement in Iraq will stretch beyond his presidency, requiring military, financial and political support from Washington. With no dramatic change in course, Bush's decision sets the stage for a fiery political debate in Congress and on the 2008 presidential campaign trail. Democrats said Bush's modest approach was unacceptable.

Wait, there's more where this came from...

A new White House report on Iraq shows slim progress, moving just one more political and security goal into the satisfactory column: efforts to let former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party to rejoin the political process. The latest conclusions largely track a comparable poor assessment in July on 18 benchmarks. The earlier White House report said the Iraqi government had made satisfactory gains toward eight benchmarks, unsatisfactory marks on eight and mixed results on two. Congress required President Bush to submit the report to lawmakers, assessing whether the Iraqi government had made progress toward achieving the 18 goals. In the new report, the Iraqi government showed positive movement on only one of the benchmarks. The White House report is more positive than two other recent Iraq progress reports that harshly criticized lack of progress in Iraq. The Sept. 6 report by the Independent Commission on the Security Forces of Iraq, chaired by retired Marine Corps Gen. James Jones, said Iraq's security forces will be unable to assume control of the country in the next 12 to 18 months without U.S. help and that the national police force is rife with corruption and infiltrated by militia forces and should be disbanded. The Government Accountability Office progress report on Iraq, released Sept. 4, said violence in Iraq remains high, fewer Iraqi security forces are capable of acting independently, and the parliament in Baghdad has failed to reach major political agreements needed to curb sectarian violence.

All I can say, is that if any of this surprises you, clearly you haven't been paying attention.

Indonesia - An 8.4-magnitude quake that shook Indonesia on Wednesday. But despite the intensity of the shallow undersea earthquake, no waves lashed the beach and the family shack was undamaged. A quirk of nature sent the full force of the tsunami out to sea, preventing a repeat of the 2004 Indian Ocean disaster that killed more than 230,000 people. Two other powerful temblors — magnitudes 7.8 and 7.1 — followed on Thursday off Sumatra and two weaker quakes were felt later. More than 30 aftershocks have rattled the region in the last day and many people refused to return to their homes, fearing a repeat of the 2004 tsunami. Sensitive to criticism about slow responses to the 2004 tsunami triggered by a magnitude-9 quake, governments issued alerts as far away as Kenya and Tanzania in East Africa, telling people to leave beaches. People in Mombasa, Kenya, crowded into buses after hearing the warning over the radio. I'm torn on this one. Are these guys unlucky because of the rash of earthquakes that continue to rattle their country, or, are they extraordinarily lucky because this time Mother Nature decided to cut them a break? Tough call.

Japan - Japan's space agency launched its much-delayed lunar probe beginning what it calls the largest mission to the moon since the U.S. Apollo flights. The Selenological and Engineering Explorer — or SELENE — probe came four years behind the agency's original schedule. The SELENE project is the largest lunar mission since the U.S. Apollo program in terms of overall scope and ambition, outpacing the former Soviet Union's Luna program and NASA's Clementine and Lunar Prospector projects, according to Japan's space agency. It involves placing the main satellite in orbit at an altitude of about 60 miles and deploying the two smaller satellites in polar orbits. Researchers will use data gathered by the probes to study the moon's origin and evolution. I'm not exactly sure why this has got everyone so excited. We've been there and done that...more than 40 years ago. Still, seeing as there is a country other than the U.S. or Russia pulling this stunt off, I suppose congratulations are in order.

China - After a more than a decade of delays, China's tallest building is slicing through Shanghai's hazy, skyscraper-studded skyline. The 101-story Shanghai World Financial Center, a 1,614 foot wedge-shaped tower with a rectangular hole at the very top, will be topped out tomorrow as its last beam is laid. The $1 billion Shanghai project, due for completion in time for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, is a monument to the city's ambitions to reclaim its status as a key international center. Taiwan's Taipei 101, at 1,667 feet, beat the building's height, taking the tallest sweepstakes in 2004. Developers of a skyscraper in oil-rich Dubai recently declared theirs the world's tallest building when construction reached 1,680 feet — and the building is still far from finished. That is one big mamba-jamba. If you don't believe me, see for yourself (click here).

U.S. Dollar - The US dollar hit to new record low against the euro ($1.3886) as investors fretted about a world credit crunch. The dollar has fallen in the past week, amid hopes that Federal Reserve will cut interest rates in a bid to reassure markets over current credit fears. At the heart of the dollar's decline have been problems in the U.S. housing market, caused by the Fed increasing interest rates in order to slow accelerating inflation. The increases have led to higher borrowing costs, triggering an increase in the number of people defaulting on loans, especially in the sub-prime mortgage market. The impact on the consumer and businesses may be mixed, analysts said. Eurozone consumers could benefit from cheaper prices for some imported goods. At the same time, there is also good news for eurozone companies because oil, metals and many raw material prices are quoted in dollars, and the strength of the euro should dampen firms' input costs. However, while the strong euro may cut some import costs, it could also have a negative effect on exports as European-made goods become more expensive. The U.S. is one of Europe's largest trading partners. This just goes to show that the world is getting smaller by the day. I will say this, anything that can get the interest rate on my home equity line to go down, I'm in favor of. That vacation to Europe can wait. Hell, they don't like us much anyway.