Necessity dictates taking the day off, so just quick links to relevant developmnents and only a couple of fast snippets today.

IRAQ IIO

Iraq summaries here and here and here. Also this.

A business executive lays the cards of reality on the table.

Iraq is virtually without power as electricity is available for only three hours a day, half of the population has no proper housing, the sewage is non-existent and network infrastructure are few. These are the immediate causes hampering the growth and development of Iraq, Dr Hameed K Ibrahim, a leading Iraqi businessman whose project has been selected by the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) as one of the best Arab innovative projects, said. He added that the development of vital sectors like power, water, oil and gas and infrastructure should be top priority for the government and her coalition partners.

“Iraq, with one of the world’s largest oil and gas reserves, is being eroded by the lack of basic amenities and deteriorating law and order situation as locals have no chance to work in Baghdad and other areas as fear haunts even law-abiding citizens. We need to see a rebuilding and reconstruction of our country without any further lapse of time. We have funds but the ground situation and growing violence is so bad that the businesses are at virtual halt resulting in unemployment of thousands engineers and other professionals.” Article

Contours of chaos.

More than 500 new cases of cholera have been confirmed since Thursday in Iraq’s northern province of Kirkuk, bringing the total number across the country to more than 3,000, the health ministry said on Monday. Article

AFGHANISTAN

Afghanistan summary here and here. Also this.

PAKISTAN

Pakistan summaries here and here and here. Also this.

RAIDERS ON THE HORN

Somalia summary here and here. Also this.

GUANTÁNAMO

Guantánamo summary here and here.

WHAT HAVE WE BECOME

Linking to this story for two reasons:

1) The intrinsic irony of the state of Texas, in a court case, arguing that G. Walker has overreached, overstepped, exceeded and nakedly grabbed power to which he is not entitled.

2) It includes valid reference to something which ye old scribe has harped on repeatedly over the years, namely that a focused (if perhaps not explicity enunciated) goal of the woebegone G. Walker adminsitration and its enablers and strategic adherents has been — and continues to be — to overturn, invalidate, sidestep, bury, or otherwise — by hook or by crook or by stealth or by increment — render non-operative Marbury v. Madison (ref. here and here), the central supporting pillar upon which the superstructure of the American government has been developed and constructed since Thomas Jefferson was in the White House.

A different but highly topically related piece here.