Foreign Policy

GOP presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty sought to claim the mantle as his party’s foreign policy hawk Tuesday

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Adm. Michael Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is poised to serve a second term as the nation's top military officer.

The Senate Armed Services Committee will hold Mullen's confirmation hearing Sept. 15.

President Obama sent Mullen's nomination to the Senate already in May.

Mullen's first two-year term as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff ends Oct. 1. President George Bush nominated Mullen on June 28, 2007. Mullen, who is well regarded on both sides of the aisle, took his post on Oct.1, 2007.

-Roxana Tiron

Libyan leader Muammar el-Qaddafi is "not welcome" to New Jersey during a potential diplomatic trip to the U.S. next month, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) said in an unusually blunt statement on Monday.

In a two sentence statement, Lautenberg made clear that Qaddafi's welcoming back to Libya last week of the man accused of bombing Pan Am Flight 103 had earned the Libyan leader a chilly reception in New Jersey.

"I am troubled by reports that Colonel Qaddafi may visit New Jersey next month," Lautenberg said. "Colonel Qaddafi can be assured that he is not welcome here."

A Scottish judge released Libyan national Abdul baset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi, the man convicted of the bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988, on compassionate grounds; al Megrahi is suffering from terminal prostate cancer.

Qaddafi embraced and welcomed al Megrahi back to his native Libya, adding fuel to the flames of an already incensed American public.

Lautenberg has been forefront amongst those lawmakers who have condemned the release of the bomber. Many of the American victims of the terrorist attack hailed from New Jersey, as well as New York.

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said he was "horrified " at celebrations in Libya that greeted the return of the Lockerbie bomber.

He also said the U.S. should introduce a resolution at the United Nations condemning the celebrations, and called for an investigation into whether the release of the bomber was related to oil contracts between Libya and Great Britain.

"That would be despicable," he said.

British officials have said there was no link between the release of the bomber and business between the two countries.

Schumer said Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton should all for Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi to apologize for the celerations that greeted the return of Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi.

Elections in Afghanistan might just have a better voter registration process than the U.S., one senator observing Afghan elections this week suggested Thursday.

Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), the only member of Congress on the ground to observe elections in Afghanistan, praised the election process in the country, where U.S. troops have been stationed since 2001.

"I'm sure there were irregularities -- I mean, this is a country that is obviously coming along, if you will, as it relates to democracy," Corker said in a conference call with journalists about the trip. "But I have to tell you, from what we observed, every single polling station was set up the same, there was a description on the wall about what to do pictorially, there were observers in every single polling place."

Corker was particularly impressed by the voter registration cards each Afghan voters were required to tote at the polls.

"The same system was set up in every single place," Corker said. "A person would come in with a registration card -- and I might add, there you cannot vote without a registration card. That's not the case even in the home states."

Overall, the first-term senator said he was generally happy with what he'd observed.

"I was very impressed with what I saw at the polling stations," Corker said.

The Obama administration expressed disappointment Thursday over the release of the man convicted of bombing Pan Am Fight 103 from a Scottish prison on "compassionate" grounds.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said the administration "deeply regrets" the release of Abdel Basset Mohamed al-Megrahi, who was convicted of the 1988 bombing over Scotland, which killed hundreds of travelers, including Americans.

"The United States deeply regrets the decision by the Scottish Executive to release Abdel Basset Mohamed al-Megrahi," Gibbs said in a statement.

A Scottish judge ordered al-Megrahi released on compassionate grounds. He is suffering from terminal prostate cancer.

The White House has continually urged against the native Libyan's release, Gibbs said.

"As we have expressed repeatedly to officials of the government of the United Kingdom and to Scottish authorities, we continue to believe that Megrahi should serve out his sentence in Scotland," Gibbs said.

U.S. officials, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Attorney General Eric Holder, along with White House officials, had been in extensive contact with counterparts in Scotland and the United Kingdom to communicate strong opposition to the release, the White House said.

"The United States is deeply disappointed by the decision of the Scottish Executive to release Abdel Basset Mohamed al-Megrahi who was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for his part in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a statement.

"We have continued to communicate our long-standing position to UK government officials and Scottish authorities that Megrahi should serve out the entirety of his sentence in Scotland," she added. "Today, we remember those whose lives were lost on December 21, 1988 and we extend our deepest sympathies to the families who live each day with the loss of their loved ones due to this heinous crime."

Seven senators had also asked Scotland to keep the convicted bomber in prison. Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.Y.) said yesterday that al-Megrahi's release would heighten the risk for terrorist attacks in the U.S.

The White House, meanwhile, expressed sympathy for family members of the victims.

"On this day, we extend our deepest sympathies to the families who live every day with the loss of their loved ones," Gibbs said. "We recognize the effects of such a loss weigh upon a family forever."

The White House says it's happy with Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.), who secured the release of an American citizen sentenced to seven years of hard labor in a Burmese prison.

Webb was not representing the White House on his trip, and it was controversial with some human rights groups who don't think U.S. officials should be having any business with Burmese leaders.

Webb thinks the sanctions policy has been a failure, and that the U.S. should engage more with Burma.

-Ian Swanson

Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.) has secured the release of an American citizen in Myanmar who was recently sentenced to seven years of hard labor in the country, according to reports.

John Yettaw of Missouri was arrested and convicted for trying to swim across a lake to reach the home of Aung San Suu Kyi, a leader of a dissident party in Myanmar who is currently under house arrest. Suu Kyi was convicted herself on Tuesday of harboring Yettaw.

"I am grateful to the Myanmar government for honoring these requests," said Webb, who is on a fact-finding trip to Myanmar.

Webb met with the country's ruling military junta while in the country, raising protests from exiled Myanmar dissidents. The Virginia Democrat also met with Suu Kyi, his staff told reporters.

The Obama administration has dug in its heels and taken a hard, unwavering line with Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez -- over Chavez's insults directed toward the game of golf, that is.

Chavez, on his "Alo Presidente!" Sunday talk show, seemed rather teed off at the pastime that occupies so many of President Obama's weekends. "Let's leave this clear," Chavez said. "Golf is a bourgeois sport." The fact that golfers ride around on little carts, Chavez continued, just shows what a lazy sport it is. The New York Times reported Tuesday that Chavez and his loyalists were pushing to close two of Venezuela's best-known golf courses to seize the prime real estate of the sprawling greens; the closures would bring the total to nine golf courses closed over the past three years.

"I respect all sports," Chavez said. "But there are sports and there are sports. Do you mean to tell me this is a people's sport? It is not."

P.J. Crowley, assistant secretary of State for public affairs, came out swinging on Wednesday.

"Before we get started formally, as the Department of State's self-appointed ambassador-at-large for golf, I wish to protest the unwarranted attack by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on the game of golf," Crowley said.

"Considering that the hemisphere celebrated the victory of former caddy and son of Argentina in the Masters over a good-old-boy who built a public course in his hometown in Kentucky, and we cheered as a relative unknown from South Carolina won the people's open on the country's finest public course at Bethpage Black, we were in awe as a 59-year-old man held off the greatest golfers of the world for 71 holes on links land in Scotland where the game of golf was created, and now we are on the eve of the season's final major, where the favorite to win is arguably the greatest golfer of all time and whose heritage literally spans continents -- so the suggestion by Mr. Chavez that golf, a truly global sport, is bourgeois is a mulligan."

"And once again Mr. Chavez, one of the hemisphere's most divisive figures, finds himself out of bounds," Crowley concluded.

There was no immediate reaction from Chavez, who has been crazy busy closing radio stations and planning hypothetical war with Colombia and the U.S.

Palestinians are to blame for a stall in peace talks with Israelis, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Thursday.

Speaking in Jerusalem, the second-ranking House Democrat said that Palestinian "preconditions" for negotiations with Israel were the "largest thing" blocking negotiations from going forward.

"I think the largest thing impeding the negotiations at this point is simply the unwillingness of [Palestinian president Mahmoud] Abbas to sit down [with the Israelis]," Hoyer said, as reported by Agence France Presse (AFP).

Palestianians have said that Israel must stop expanding its West Bank settlements before the two parties can meet again at the bargaining table.

"The United States' policy has been for a stop to any additional settlements," Hoyer said. "That is a thorny, tough issue...It's an issue that has to be solved at the negotiating table."

29 Democrats, led by Hoyer, are on a trip to Israel this week. Last week, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) led a delegation of Republicans to Israel.