Joshua Keating's blog

George Horne, Deputy Executive Director of Operations & Maintenance Resources, rolls out a preserved Burmese Python which was captured in Miami-Dade County, Florida, during a hearing before the Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security Subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill November 6, 2009 in Washington, DC. The hearing was focused on H.R. 2811, a bill to amend title 18, United States Code, to include constrictor snakes of the species Python genera as an injurious animal.

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Journalists often like to start out an interview with a softball question to break the ice before moving on to controversial topics. This tactic clearly doesn't work on former Polish President and Solidarity leader Lech Walesa:

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Are you looking forward to travelling to Berlin on Monday for the 20th anniversary celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall?

Walesa: It's not important whether I'm looking forward to it or not. I am a politician who played an important role in the reunification of Germany and I was invited to take part in the celebration. It's not like a piece of candy handed out to a sweet little boy.

It was nice of the city of Berlin to organize a U2 concert as part of the celebrations for 20th anniversary of the fall of the wall, but putting up 2-meter wall to keep people out was an unfortunate decision:  

True, there were no minefields or watchtowers, but the new temporary wall erected before the performance certainly sent the wrong signals.

Only 10,000 fans in possession of previously allocated free tickets were allowed to pass through the checkpoints — yes, checkpoints — to listen to the Irish band.

The Obama administration, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in particular, seems to have developed a bit of a "mission accomplished" problem when it comes to diplomatic breakthroughs. Last week Clinton hailed Benjamin Netanyahu's "unprecedented" concessions on settlement construction, when it was fairly clear that Palestinians didn't see evidence of any concessions and touted a "historic agreement" to end the ongoing political standoff in Honduras, though it should have been obvious that neither side had any incentive to follow through on the terms of the deal. 

Today, it's fairly obvious that Clinton was overselling both developments with Mahmoud Abbas announcing that he will quit (true or not) and Manuel Zelaya declaring, "the accord is dead."

The administration has had a number of diplomatic "breakthroughs" that didn't pan out lately. Hamid Karzai's agreement to hold a runoff election in Afghanistan was followed by Abdullah Abdulla's decision to pull out. Dmitry Medvedev's seeming openness to Iran sanctions was contradicted by his own foreign minister. And the Iranian negotiators who agreed to a deal on nuclear enrichment, apparently didn't check with the bosses back in Tehran.

This isn't to say that these efforts were a waste of time or that the setbacks were the fault of the U.S., but out of desire for a tangible foreign policy victory, the administration seems to be developing a tendency to oversell diplomatic tactical victories before it's clear if the other parties will follow through on their commitments. 

I agree with Dan Drezner, that no one with reasonable expectations of what U.S. foreign policy can accomplish should be shocked by the fact that the Obama team hasn't achieved major breakthroughs on any of these challenges, but it would be nice if they didn't keep telling us we were witnessing history in the making. 

Olivier Douliery-Pool/Getty Images 

Honduran politicians apparently didn't get the memo that last week's U.S.-mediated deal had ended their country's political deadlock:

Zelaya's supporters say that failure to approve the deal in the next few days would kill the final opportunity to legitimize this month's presidential elections by keeping a government in power that no foreign leaders have recognized. They warn there could be more of the street protests and repressive government countermoves that have sunk the country's economy.

However, Honduras' congressional leadership has postponed the crucial vote by asking the country's Supreme Court, attorney general and human rights ombudsman to give nonbinding opinions on the legality of Zelaya's return.

One sign that this is far from over is that Zelaya still won't leave the Brazilian embassy -- where he has been hold up since sneaking back into Honduras in September -- for fear of arrest. Something tells me that Zelaya has spent all this time sleeping on an aerobed having music blasted at him at 2 a.m. just to finish off the last few weeks of his term. That's why Micheletti's supporters aren't likely to let him anywhere near the presidency before the elction -- which most countries have promised not to recognize.

So essentially, we're back where we started.  

Thailand peripatetic former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has turned up in Cambodia, where he has been named a special economic advisor to the government. As Thailand's current government is seeking Thaksin extradition on corruption charges, they're not too thrilled about this development and have recalled their ambassador from Cambodia:

[Thai prime minister] Abhisit accused Cambodia of interfering in Thailand's internal affairs, and a foreign ministry official said bilateral co-operation agreements would be reviewed.

"Last night's announcement by the Cambodian government harmed the Thai justice system and really affected Thai public sentiment," Mr Abhisit said.

The Cambodian government claims they want to take advantage of Thaksin's business expertise, though it's likely also relishing the chance to irritate Thailand. The two countires have been engaged in border skirmishes in recent months.

It's been an interesting year for Thaksin, who has demonstrated a Carmen Sandiego-like ability to generate controversy around the world while evading arrest. In April, he was named an honorary Nicaraguan ambassador and granted a passport by Daniel Ortega's government. He was also granted a residency permit in Germany under false pretenses a few months later with a member of his entourage claiming to be German intelligence agent. 

So, gumshoes, where will Thaksin turn up next?

SAEED KHAN/AFP/Getty Image

Andrew Sullivan posts the following video from Tehran today, showing opposition demonstrators chanting, "Obama, Obama, you're either with us or with them":

Another features the chant (according to TehranBureau's translation), "A Green and blooming Iran doesn't need an Atom Bomb."

As Joshua Kucera notes, these videos seem rather odd given that the Iranian opposition movement has been extremely careful not to identify itself with U.S. foreign policy goals. Opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi has also expressed support  for Iran's nuclear enrichment program. Could these marchers have been planted?

Writing for Eurasianet, Aunohita Mojumda makes the case that Abdullah Abdullah is the real winner in the Afghan election debacle:

Heading into the August 20 election, Abdullah, an ethnic Tajik, stood virtually no chance of winning the election -- whether outright in the first round, or in a run-off -- because of his inability to muster a united opposition. Given his previous political roles, most notably as Karzai’s foreign minister until 2006, Abdullah lacked a strong and cohesive political base to support his candidacy. Even the ethnic-Tajik opposition failed to unite around him. A key Northern Alliance ally, Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim, campaigned for Karzai.

Nevertheless, Abdullah emerged as the man of the moment. His skillful campaigning caused his popularity to surge, said Mir. "He had lost touch with the ordinary people as foreign minister. Now he has emerged as a national leader," the political analyst said.

Ironically, Abdullah’s prestige is now probably higher following the first-round vote-rigging scandal than it would have been had August 20 balloting been deemed largely free and fair.

This could be seen as the electoral equivalent of the "Streisand Effect," an Internet phenomenon often invoked by my colleague Evgeny Morozov in which attempts to censor information give it more publicity and impact than it would have had on its own. By attempting to rig the vote, Afghan authorities turned a not-particularly-credible Afghan politician into a credible international public figure.

Majid Saeedi/Getty Images