"Contemporary political theater may resemble a Balinese cockfight, especially, if you feel you have to constantly defend your wife against personal attacks or when you are elevated to the dubious status reserved for blonde celebrity divas like Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. As we approach the critical months of the national campaign, Obama may need to recall the oedipal lessons learned from his step-father or consult his notes on the Balinese cockfight."

"How did the country get into this unholy financial mess? Think usury! Acclaimed author William Greider points the finger at banks, and people of great wealth, “taking advantage of poor people by lending them money on terms that are sure to fail.” He blames others, too, like “The Fed,” under the reign of Alan Greenspan, the U.S. Congress, and Wall Street. Mr. Greider charges that these parties worked to “castrate” the watchdogs."

"If a State and society needs to be successfully steered towards stability, progress and internal unity, there is no room for immature, reactive, secretive and cliquish decision-making."

"In the end, he has fallen: not because of the criminal war, not because of his lack of seriousness in pursuing peace, not because of the appointment of a Minister of Justice whose aim is to destroy the judicial system, but because of cash in envelopes and free trips abroad."

"Since its founding a decade ago, the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions has rebuilt 150 Palestinian homes as part of its campaign to bring the issue of demolitions to the attention of Israeli Jews and the international community. It has been an uphill struggle, Mr Halper said. The European Union, which recently upgraded its relations with Israel, announced this month that it was withdrawing ICAHD’s funding."

"What's in place is a profit-driven system of health care with devastating effects on human beings. Even the most illuminating stats tend to become glib, abstracting calibration of damage to lives in the United States, where at any moment 47 million people are uninsured and another 50 million are badly under-insured."

"An Israel-Syria peace process with heavy American input is more likely to succeed than an Israeli-Palestinian process, and the payoff, the peace dividend, is potentially far greater for the region-at-large and particularly the Iraq and Iran arenas."

"The strategy of keeping all options open for a final agreement has proven unwise. A new administration would be wise to understand that an open-ended approach allows both sides to pursue their own interests regardless of the effect on peace-making. That way offers only more violence and oppression."