Gulf Stream Blues

It’s official, the United States will install missiles in Poland pointed at Russia. The historic and highly controversial deal was signed in Warsaw this afternoon by Condoleezza Rice, ushering in a new era in Russo-Western relations. The dream of Russia as a Western ally is over.

The decision by Poland to allow the US to build its missile base there, and a mirror decision by the Czech Republic to build a twin radar facility in that country, seemingly couldn’t come at a worse time for relations between Russia and the West. Set as it is with the backdrop of the Georgia conflict, the timing is likely to enrage Russia even further.

Things seem to be getting worse before they get better in Georgia. At the moment, according to Georgia, there is a 100-vehicle tank convoy heading again toward the capital, and Russia now controls 1/3 of the country. The Sarkozy-brokered EU cease fire agreement doesn't appear to be working.

As the world tries to figure out what to do about this mess, I was struck by something in John McCain's editorial, entitled, We Are all Georgians, in the Wall Street Journal today. McCain's editorial was strongly worded and stark, and there's speculation tonight that President Bush's decision to send Secretary of State Condoleeza Rise to Tblisi was driven by not being a desire to not be overshadowed by McCain. Meanwhile Obama seems to be nowhere to be found.

It’s certainly been a tense couple days, with the west watching in disbelief as Russia launches what seems to be a full-scale invasion of its Southern neighbor Georgia. Considering this is a country that, theoretically, almost joined NATO at the Bucharest summit a few months ago, this is quite a provocation to the West. Nothing seems clear right now about what Russia’s intentions are or even what they’re doing, but one thing is certain: relations between the West and Russia have been fundamentally altered by the last few days events.

The British buzz today is all about UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband’s manifesto in yesterday’s Guardian which, depending on who you ask, is either being grossly misinterpreted by the media or an outrageous act of disloyalty. Right now the question remains: Is David Miliband going to challenge Gordon Brown in the fall?

His interview later today with BBC Radio Two's Jeremy Vine may settle this question if he explicitly denies planning to challenge Brown – which apparently Downing Street is demanding he do. If he doesn’t, then chances are he almost certainly plans to, and it will be all out civil war in the Labour Party.

What can I say, the Cote D’Azur is truly stunning. Every day on this trip we’ve enjoyed beautiful sunny weather, swimming dips in a sparking blue sea, with stunning views of seaside and mountains. We had to take a moment and soak it all in when we first entered the Riviera area, stopping off at a jagged cliff on the coast near Cavalier-Sur-Mer to have a picnic with some local French cuisine we had purchased at the market(fortunately picked out by my friends, I must confess to my culinary ignorance). The only sign of people in this remote spot were the handful of nude sunbathers on the small bit of sand below. We were lucky our guide book told us about this one section of the coast that hasn’t been built up.

I’m here in Montpellier, France after an amazing weekend in Barcelona. So far the trip has been really fun, Barcelona is an amazing city and I feel like we saw many different sides to it over the three days. Driving from Barcelona to Montpellier yesterday was also really amazing; watching the landscapes, language and culture change as we drove over the Pyranees reminded me of why I love driving on trips. In Catalonia the land was much drier, and when we stopped in Gerona for dinner it still looked very Spanish. Once we crossed the Alps and arrived in Perpignan things instantly took on a different look. Everything seemed much greener, for instance.

Here we go again. Last night the Belgian government collapsed, just four months after it was formed in March. Before then, the nation had been without a government for nine months while the French- and Dutch-speaking parties were unable to form a unity government.

Belgium’s King Albert II is considering the resignation, but he doesn’t really have much leeway to block it. The prime minister of the four-month-old coalition government, Yves Leterme, had set a deadline of July 15 for getting an agreement on devolving more power to the regions. Belgium is made up of Dutch-speaking Flanders in the North, French-speaking Wallonia in the South and Brussels, which is French-speaking but located within Flanders. The Flemish, who are wealthier, want more local power, but the Walloons are resisting this because it would marginalize their influence.

Along with the pomp of the Bastille Day celebrations this weekend in Paris, the city will see another grand occastion: the first meeting of the “Mediterranean Union,” Nicolas Sarkozy’s pet project that he has made the centrepiece of France’s EU presidency. But the way Sunday’s meeting is being discussed, you’d think it was nothing more than a Camp David-style retreat. So is it the inaugural meeting of a new international body, or lip service to an idea that has failed to take flight?

Sarkozy’s vision of an alternative union has been watered down so much it is now almost unrecognizable from what he proposed during the French election campaign. What was originally intended to be a full-blown union offered as an alternative to the EU has now become a loose association that will be managed by the EU itself. It’s not surprising then that the union is now being labelled ‘Club Med,’ suggesting it is just a diplomatic association which will exchange pleasantries. Press reports looking ahead to Sunday’s meeting have focused almost entirely on the diplomatic aspect, noting that some of the world’s most bitter enemies will be sitting at the same table for the first time, including the leaders of Israel and Syria. Little is being said of what the union is supposed to accomplish because no one is quite sure at this point – the projects it has announced so far are little more than feel-good cooperation initiatives on things like cleaning up pollution and sharing solar panel technology.

The difference between the Labour and Conservative parties in the UK has become increasingly blurred over the last 15 years. But yesterday David Cameron, the Conservative leader who is leading the charge to bring the party further to the centre, unleashed some of the old class divisions that have historically defined the parties by saying that poor people have themselves to blame for their poverty. The comments were part of a wider speech about society's increased permissiveness and a lack of personal responsibility.

It's of course an old familiar refrain by the right, but it seems to run contrary to Cameron's attempts to redefine the party. It may be, however, that with Labour doing so poorly in the polls and with an election still likely a year off, Cameron is feeling confident enough to throw the older, more conservative members of the party a bone.

The reaction to the dramatic rescue of Colombian hostage Ingrid Betancourt and 14 others this week has received some unusual coverage in the European press, quite different from that in the US. If one didn’t know the back story behind this situation they might think the coverage downright bizarre.

Betancourt is due to arrive in Paris at any moment to greet French President Nicolas Sarkozy. The meeting is largely required by political necessity, as Sarkozy and his predecessors had made the release of Betancourt one of France’s top diplomatic priorities, and Sarkozy has been working tirelessly for a diplomatic solution between the Colombian government and FARC, the leftist guerilla militia that took her hostage. Betancourt is a dual French and Colombian citizen.But the pleasantries that will be exchanged at the Elysee Palace tonight mask an embarrassing reality for France: in the end it was not France’s tireless diplomatic efforts that rescued Betancourt but a US-backed military operation in which France had no involvement whatsoever. That has to be a tough pill for the country to swallow.