A shootout in the Israeli-occupied Gaza strip left 11 people wounded and one Palestinian policeman killed, according to a story on the BBC. Two conflicting reports describe the melee, with the police report detailing an "assassination attempt" on police chief Ghazi al-Jabali by unknown assailants. The other report claims that an internal police dispute resulted in a policeman "opening fire in all directions."

Gaza is one of the areas captured by Israel during the six-day war in 1967, and is still controlled by Israeli forces, with 1.3 million Palestinians living there and around 8000 Israeli settlers. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon surprised the world recently when he announced plans to remove Israeli settlements from Gaza, however, critics are now claiming that it may be a ploy to deflect criticism from potential bribery charges.

Sharon has consistently been one of the most hard-line conservative Israeli Prime Ministers in recent history. While an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza would please most of the world - the worst thing Sharon could do for the Palestinians would be to leave them in their current weakened condition (as indicated by today's violence) after leaving.

Democratic hopeful Howard Dean may be facing the end of the road, according to the Washington Post, as he heads to Wisconsin to campaign for the February 17th primary election. Dean's rise from relatively obscure Vermont governor to Democratic frontrunner, mainly due to his unique organization and internet support, has been compared with the fate of the internet companies of the late 90's. The "crash" seems to have already happened, with a disappointing Iowa caucus. Dean is betting that he will rebound in Wisconsin just like the few worthwhile ventures on the internet have in recent years, and regain the momentum that has already begun to dissipate from his campaign. With a pay freeze in effect for his staffers though, he'd better score a major coup in Wisconsin or consider it quitting time.

11 cuban refugees were picked up by the US coast as they tried to land on the Florida coast in a converted 1959 Buick, according to Reuters. They are expected to be returned to Cuba for repatriation.

Relations with Cuba have deteriorated since the election of President Bush, and his hard-line stance against communist leader Fidel Castro is seen by many as an appeasement to Cuban-American voters, mainly in Florida, who helped get him into the White House in 2000. This stance was a change from President Clinton's apparent thawing towards Cuba late in his term. Given the fact that Fidel Castro has now outlasted nine US presidential administrations, and is working on his tenth, does anyone actually think that sanctions are hurting him? Maybe we should take a cue from China - prosperity and trade are the quickest routes to civilized relations.

As France's national assembly gears up to vote on what is rapidly becoming one of the most divisive issues of the year, former Prime Minister Alain Juppe urged a "massive" vote in favor of the measure to ban headscarfs and other religious clothing in public schools. Juppe claims "It's not paranoia to say that today we are facing a rise in political-religious fanaticism," in a comment aimed primarily at French muslims, the second largest religious group in the secular state.

His opponents, however, assert that banning muslim (and other religious) clothing in public schools will be "perceived ... as a regression of liberties..."

This latest effort, seen by some as a thinly veiled attempt to stifle islamic identity movements in France, come on the heels of the 2002 election's surprising support of ultra-conservative Jean-Marie Le Pen. Le Pen lost the election by a wide margin to Jacques Chirac, but his unexpected and unprecedented support as well as violence against muslims may be an indication of a growing disdain for muslim immigrants and the organization of a new, conservative French political movement.

The Supreme Judicial Court in Massachusetts have found that homosexual couples have a constitutional right to marriage, as opposed to civil unions. Four justices on the court wrote:

The ruling was given after the Massachusetts legislature asked whether civil unions would suffice after its ruling in November stating that gay couples are entitled to rights equal to marriage.

President Bush issued a statement on the Court’s ruling, stating that if “activist judges insist on re-defining marriage by court order, the only alternative will be the constitutional process.”

Growing shockingly less relevant with each day, much like the candidates themselves:
The Democratic Candidates and their Cartoon Equivalents

In a dramatic turnaround of policy, the New York Times describes how the Bush administration intends to use the UN to assist in setting up a provisional Iraqi government. Conservative pundits have previously scorned the rush to Iraqi self-government as the limp-wristed desires of the "secular French" or the "ineffectual UN." This change comes in the the face of increasing political pressure at home from both the left and the right that Iraq is distracting the US from more pressing goals in the war on terror. The Times suggests that bringing Iraq to the point where it can govern itself will not be easy, with ideological clashes between Sunni and Shite muslims, and the powerful Ayatollah Sistani refusing to negotiate with any American representative. With anti-war activists, prior to the war, calling for increased UN involvement, and member states opposed to the war now demanding it, the pressure on Kofi Annan to bring Iraq to a workable government will be immense. Let's just hope he can figure out a way for Iraqis to resolve internal disputes without resorting to the forceful government of a Ba'athist-style regime.

In what has turned out to be a prophetic article in yesterday's Washington Post, voters in South Carolina supported both John Edwards and John Kerry over Al Sharpton by a wide margin. Prior to the South Carolina primary, pundits had speculated that the nearly 30% black population of the State could give the Sharpton campaign a boost, with Sharpton being the only remaining black Democratic hopeful after the withdrawal of Carol Mosely-Braun. However, the DNC's anyone but Bush campaign seems to be working, as voters of all ethnicities seem to be placing support behind Democratic primary candidates considered more "electable" despite possible ideological discrepancies. This approach begs the question - will blindly replacing Bush with anyone else really help those who elect his replacement?

In a New York Times editorial, Nicholas Kristof (requires login) blasts President Bush's 2004 budget, calling it "high risk intellectual dishonesty" and claiming that he is "half as honest as with the American public as Clinton was," by omitting small details, like multi-billion dollar expenditures in Iraq. These words are sure to arouse some ire in Republican camps, where the name Bill Clinton is synonymous with Mephistopheles. Kristof echoes claims made by Paul Krugman, Princeton University economist and Bush administration critic, that the US is heading down the dubious path already forged by countries like Argentina and Japan in the late 80's. Will reckless spending and massive deficits cause a "crisis of confidence" in the American economy? Whether "trickle down economics" will eventually bail us out of the growing hole of national debt or cause the whole system to come crashing down around us, the American taxpayers deserve an honest assessment - and President Bush isn't giving it.

After finally realizing what everyone else has known since before the Iowa caucases, Connecticut Senator and former Vice-Presidential candidate Joe Lieberman today announced he will not continue to seek the Democratic presidential nomination. Lieberman was widely considered the most moderate of all the Democratic hopefuls, a message that played well in the 2000 election with Al Gore but may no longer be timely in George Bush's more politicized 2004 America. Lieberman's poor showing may be more reflective of the politics of the Democratic faithful than of Americans at large, however. It remains to be seen whether a more progressive Democratic candidate can carry a sharply divided American public in November.