TMZ's guerrilla-journalism interview with Katie Couric, above, is making the rounds. Best part: Couric says, "Everyone lies about The Economist, but I actually read it."

KAREN BLEIER/AFP/Getty Images

Think Richard Fuld didn't humiliate himself enough yesterday?

Appearing before Rep. Henry Waxman's House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Monday, the Lehman Brothers CEO said he felt "horrible" about his company's collapse, adding, "I wake up every single night wondering what I could have done differently."

"Your company is now bankrupt and our country is in a state of crisis," Waxman asked. "You get to keep $480 million. I have a very basic question: Is that fair?"

Ouch. Pretty embarrassing, right?

Well, this is how they do corporate apologies in Japan:

That's via James at Japan Probe, who explains that the man in the video is president of a study abroad company that went bankrupt.

UPDATE: I'm not sure if this kind of stuff happens in Japan, however. 

I love this story about a wealthy Abu Dhabi investor who wanted to buy the Manchester United soccer club, butwas disappointed by the price he was offered:

The investor, an Abu Dhabi royal who had earned billions last year, was not interested in a bargain -- he was looking for a huge deal to make an impressive splash internationally. A multibillion-dollar price tag, easily within his group's means, would cause far more jaws to drop than anything in the millions.

"When he thought it was $4 billion, he was really excited," said Bhoyrul, who declined to name the individual. "When he found out it was $400 million, he was disappointed."

Top Story

Mario Tama/Getty Images

It was another ugly Monday on Wall Street and in markets around the world.

The Dow Jones industrial average dropped below 10,000 points for the first time in four years, while the S&P 500 fell 3.85 percent. London's FTSE suffered its largest points fall in history. All told, some $2.5 trillion in shareholder value was wiped out.

Now, according to the New York Times, the $700 billion U.S. bailout "looks like a pebble tossed into a churning sea." Major, coordinated international action may be needed to shore up confidence.

Credit markets remained nearly frozen as British lenders sought emergency funding and Iceland nationalized Landsbanki, its No.2 bank.

"Deceleration of growth and deteriorating financial conditions, combined with monetary tightening, will trigger business failures and possibly banking emergencies," warns World Bank President Robert Zoellick.

Nearly 60 percent of Americans believe a "depression" is likely.

Even the pope is weighing in, saying yesterday, "He who builds only on visible and tangible things like success, career and money builds the house of his life on sand."

Decision '08

John McCain, taking a harsher line against the Democratic nominee yesterday, asked, "Who is the real Barack Obama?" His running mate, Sarah Palin, also got rough.

Republican strategist Mike Murphy is not impressed.

Obama is taking the lead in the key swing state of Ohio.

Americas

In Brazil, wiretapping is becoming a tool of first resort.

Tijuana's notorious Arellano Felix drug cartel is being massacred. But by whom?

Asia

Even Burma is now warning its people to stay away from Chinese dairy products.

China is suspending military and diplomatic exchanges with the United States.

Thai police used tear gas at a mass rally against new PM Somchai Wongsawat.

A suicide bomber killed at least 20 people in Pakistan Monday.

Middle East and Africa

In Saudi-brokered talks, the Taliban is said to be severing its ties to al Qaeda.

The Arab League is dispatching an envoy to Iraq in a sign of warming relations.

Iran is building a car especially designed for women.

Europe and the Caucasus

Britain's climate-change watchdog wants the country to nearly end its use of fossil fuels for power in 20 years.

The U.S. military will remain in Kosovo through 2009.

Plucky Georgia is falling short when it comes to press freedoms.

Today's Agenda

U.S. President George W. Bush speaks on the economy at 1:45 p.m. ET.

The U.S. presidential candidates hold their second of three debates at 9 p.m. ET.

The boards of World Bank and the International Monetary Fund begin their annual joint meetings in Washington.

Yesterday, Lehman Brothers CEO Richard S. Fuld Jr. got an earful before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Today, it's former AIG chief Maurice R. Greenberg's turn.

The Los Angeles Times reviewed John McCain's record in the Navy and found him to be "a pilot who early in his career was cocky, occasionally cavalier and prone to testing limits."

Imagine! A cocky fighter pilot.

Granted, there are only so many ways photographers can show a stock market in decline. Still, couldn't the folks at Getty Images leave this poor German trader alone and find someone else to use as a stand-in for an entire continent's economic fears?

Here she is earlier today, a terse, worried look on her face as Germany's DAX Index plunges to its lowest point since July 2006:

Mario Vedder/Getty Images

Here she was on Sept. 30 as the DAX crossed below 6,000 points:

THOMAS LOHNES/AFP/Getty Images

Here she was looking cautiously optimistic on Sept. 19 as the Dax rose on news of the Wall St. bailout:

THOMAS LOHNES/AFP/Getty Images

And here she was pursing her lips disapprovingly on a particularly grim Sept. 16, in a photo that made the front page of the Financial Times:

THOMAS LOHNES/AFP/Getty Images

I bet she wishes she can go back to the days of Sept. 15, when she could do her job in relative obscurity:

Ralph Orlowski/Getty Images

UPDATE: The woman's name is Simone Wallmeyer. The Independent interviewed her Friday. "I'm afraid I get photographed because of the board rather than me," she told the paper.

(Thanks to a sharp-eyed Passport reader for the name.)

Top Story

Scott Halleran/Getty Images

With a month to go before U.S. voters head to the polls on Nov. 4, the presidential candidates are taking off the proverbial gloves. Or as Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan expressed her fear on Sunday's Meet the Press, "They're going to open up the gates of hell."

Hoping to change the dynamics of a race that increasingly favors Barack Obama, John McCain and his campaign have resumed making the case that Obama is untrustworthy and has dubious past associations.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, McCain's running mate, said Saturday that Obama has been "palling around with terrorists," pointing to a New York Times story that actually downplays Obama's ties with 1960s radical Bill Ayers.

Obama, who appears to have associated with Ayers in Chicago but not been especially friendly, called the attacks "smears" and promised to keep focusing on the economy. Meanwhile, his campaign has been hitting McCain hard on healthcare and released a tough ad attacking McCain as "erratic" and "out of touch" on economic issues. His campaign will also reportedly dredge up McCain's involvement in the "Keating Five" scandal.

Global Economy

As Europe's financial crisis deepens, Europe's top leaders are taking independent action to save major banks. Tyler Cowen comments.

The passage Friday of the U.S. bailout plan doesn't appear of have calmed the world's stock markets. Stocks plunged sharply today in Europe and Asia.

Americas

More U.S. bank failures are on the way.

Business is booming at a Mexico City boutique selling bulletproof clothing.

Brazil's local elections are a mixed bag for President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

Asia

Kim Jong Il appeared in public, according to the North Korean state press.

At least 33 people were killed in fighting in northeast India.

China is upset about the United States' selling $6 billion in weaponry to Taiwan.

Middle East and Africa

Michael Gordon looks at the U.S. presidential candidates' divergent goals in Iraq.

Saudi Arabia recently hosted peace talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government. Britain's top general in Afghanistan approves.

Sudan fires back at criticism from Sarah Palin and Joe Biden.

Europe and the Caucasus

Russian troops have begun dismantling checkpoints in the buffer zone surrounding South Ossetia.

From 2010 to 2015, the United States will have to rely on Russia to get its astronauts to the International Space Station.

The credit crisis is hitting Iceland especially hard.

Today's Agenda

The U.S. Supreme Court begins its new term.

Three Europeans have won the Nobel Prize in medicine. Later this week: physics, chemistry, and peace.

The U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform holds a hearing on Lehman Brothers' collapse.

"Miss C" writes to economist Tim Harford:

Dear Economist: Should I take Lehman’s collapse lying down?

I work as an escort in Canary Wharf. I wonder if you might have some sound business advice on how workers in my industry should tackle the sudden drop in demand following the collapse of Lehman Brothers?

It's anecdotal, but this would appear to contradict Sudhir Venkatesh's theory.

Spencer Platt/Getty Images

An overview of Ground Zero on Oct. 2 in New York City. The owners of the World Trade Center site have announced that the World Trade Center memorial can be opened on Sept. 11, 2011, the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attack. It was also revealed in a 70-page report on Ground Zero's tortured rebuilding process that the rail hub will cost $3.2 billion, $700 million more than planned, and will not open until at least 2014.

The Freedom Tower won't be finished until the end of 2013.

CQ's Jeff Stein reports that State Department staffers are signing up for service in rough neighborhoods:

Volunteers are flocking to the war zones now, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced this week, with slots in Iraq and Afghanistan filled through next summer."

The American Foreign Service Association crows:

AFSA hopes that those journalists, media outlets, and commentators who erroneously reported last October that the Department of State had been unable to fully staff the Iraq mission will now show as much zeal in reporting that, in fact, every one of these positions in both Iraq and Afghanistan for summer 2009 has been filled more than eight months in advance. Those journalists did a great disservice to the Department of State and its employees -- who have never shied away from hardship service in some of the most dangerous places on earth -- and we hope that these journalists will now set the record straight.

Duly noted.

Update: As one of those journalists who allegedly did a "great disservice to the Department of State and its employees," let me just point out that the department was posting open and withering criticism of the foreign service officers in question on its own blog. If the media owes American diplomats an apology, so do they. -Josh Keating

SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images

One of the more substantive moments of disagreement in last night's debate came when Joe Biden and Sarah Palin tangled over whether a "surge" was needed in Afghanistan.

When Palin said that "the surge principles that have worked in Iraq need to be implemented in Afghanistan, also," Biden saw an opening, and mentioned that U.S. Gen. David D. McKiernan (left), the top NATO commander in Afghanistan, had just said that "Afghanistan is not Iraq" and that he wouldn't use the term "surge" to describe what is needed there.

"He said we need more troops," Biden emphasized, referring to McKiernan. "We need government-building. We need to spend more money on the infrastructure in Afghanistan."

To which Palin responded, "McClellan did not say definitively the surge principles would not work in Afghanistan. [...] The counterinsurgency strategy going into Afghanistan, clearing, holding, rebuilding the civil society and the infrastructure can work in Afghanistan."

Democrats are scoring this exchange as a clear victory for Biden -- especially since Palin botched the commander's name -- but I am not so sure.

Here's why. McKiernan also said, "I don't want the military to be engaging the tribes" and indicated he would prefer to work through the central government. Given Afghanistan's history and tribal makeup, "It wouldn't take much to go back to a civil war," he warned.

I'm pretty sure Palin has little in-depth conception of what the "surge" principles mean and how they might apply in South Asia. (See here for a recent essay exploring this issue further.)

It's self-evidently true that Afghanistan is not Iraq. The problem, though, is that McKiernan is probably wrong about engaging the tribes -- and Biden ought to be very skeptical of the general's analysis. After all, one key reason the insurgency was tamed in Iraq was that the U.S. military essentially began paying tribal insurgents not to attack them. Just yesterday, the British ambassador to Kabul was caught warning that President Hamid Karzai's government is on the verge of collapse. Afghanistan has never had a strong central government. And as former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst and tribal expert Pat Lang points out, Afghan tribes are a fact of life with which the United States must deal:

The Afghan government of today is merely one of the many "players" in the complex socio-political situation in Afghanistan. If the United States backs the Karzai government with the idea of creating a highly centralized state in Afghanistan, then it is going down the road to re-creating the same social chaos that led to several years of ferocious tribal and factional revolt in Iraq.

Afghanistan is never going to be the kind of country that the neocons would like to see. Success in Afghanistan will require a realistic use (manipulation if you prefer) of the actual playing pieces on the board of Afghan Chess.

Top Story

PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images

Appearing in their first and only debate Thursday evening, U.S. vice presidential candidates Joe Biden and Sarah Palin said little beyond the expected talking points.

But if Democrats were hoping for a fumbling Palin, whose recent television interviews showed the Alaska governor often struggling to answer basic questions, they would have been disappointed last night. Using folksy phrases such as "heck of a lot" and "darn right," she stuck largely to prepared statements and adapted them to fit -- or ignore altogether -- what were fairly predictable questions from moderator Gwen Ifill.

Biden appeared deeply knowledgable, especially on foreign-policy issues such as Darfur. At one point, the Delaware senator appeared to tear up when alluding to his first wife's death and being a single father. He largely avoided seeming brusque or condescending, though at times got derailed by dwelling on Senate procedure or his own record, rather than that of his running mate, Barack Obama. Neither candidate, however, made any major mistakes.

Politico's Roger Simon thinks Palin dominated the debate. "Where was this woman during her interview with Katie Couric?" asks David Brooks in his New York Times column. "She had no problem meeting the exceptionally low expectations," Dana Milbank quips for the Washington Post. Doubts, however, are likely to linger about her fitness for the country's No. 2 job, and the debate seems not to have altered the basic dynamics of the race. "Averaging expectations, style and points, it was a wash," assesses political analyst Marc Ambinder.

The big loser? Ifill, who has been roundly panned by Internet pundits on both sides for failing to keep answers on topic and ask follow-up questions.

Decision '08

John McCain appears to be conceding Michigan.

The British ambassador to Washington's frank, seven-page assessment of Obama has leaked to the Telegraph.

A top Vatican official called the Democrats the "party of death."

Economy

Struggling U.S. regional bank Wachovia has been acquired by Wells Fargo.

Americas

Hundreds of penguins continue to wash up mysteriously on Brazilian shores.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon wants to decriminalize drugs under certain conditions.

California is seeking $7 billion in emergency funds.

Asia

China is allegedly spying on text messages in Skype.

The fighting in Pakistan's tribal belt is becoming a full-scale war. The families of U.N. staff have been ordered to leave Islamabad, the capital.

Asian markets fell Friday on gloomy U.S. economic news.

Middle East and Africa

The U.S. Defense Department is still paying contractors to produce pro-American publicity in Iraq.

Yesterday's mosque bombings in Baghdad suggest that sectarian reconciliation remains elusive.

The financial crisis is sparking a surge in anti-Semitism on the Internet.

Europe

The United States should no longer be a "megaregulator," says Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she wants to slow Georgian and Ukraine's NATO bids.

European leaders are divided on what to do about the financial crisis.

Today's Agenda

The U.S. House of Representatives is due to vote on the revised bailout bill.

British PM Gordon Brown is expected to reshuffle his cabinet.

Fire away.

... Josh Keating comments, "You can't have a team of mavericks. You'd never get anything done."

... For the record, the commanding U.S. general in Afghanistan is named David D. McKiernan, not "McClellan."

HR 7801 – approving the U.S.-India peaceful nuclear cooperation agreement

·        H.R. 7801 was approved by the House of Representatives on September 27 by a vote of 298-117, with one member voting present.  The Senate Committee on Foreign Relations approved identical legislation (S. 3548) on September 23 by a vote of 19-2.

·        The bill gives final approval to the agreement with India on peaceful nuclear cooperation.  In the “Hyde Act” (P.L. 109-401), Congress set certain terms and conditions for the agreement, in order to permit the President to submit the agreement under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954. 

·        The Senate approved the Hyde Act by a vote of 85-12 on November 16, 2006 (the conference report was approved by voice vote on December 9, 2006).  Under the Hyde Act and the Atomic Energy Act, the agreement cannot enter into force unless Congress approves the agreement.

·        The Hyde Act required the President to make several determinations to Congress in submitting the agreement.  These included –

o       that India has provided the United States and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) a credible plan to separate its civil and military nuclear facilities;

o       that India and the IAEA have concluded all legal steps required prior to signature of an IAEA safeguards agreement;

o       that India and the IAEA are making substantial progress toward concluding an Additional Protocol to the safeguards agreement, based on the Model Additional Protocol; and

o       that the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), an informal organization consisting of 44 countries, has decided by consensus to permit supply to India of nuclear items covered by the NSG guidelines.

·        The President made the required determinations on September 10, 2008, a few days after the NSG, meeting in Vienna, gave approval to nuclear commerce with India.

·        H.R. 7081 was developed on a bipartisan basis by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and in consultation with the Department of State.  The Bush Administration supports H.R. 7081.

·        The bill waives the 30-day consultation requirement in the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, because this 30 day clock is not expected to elapse until mid-October.

·        The bill also improves congressional oversight, and sets forth markers regarding implementation of the agreement and U.S. non-proliferation policy, specifically:

1.      It makes clear that all aspects of the Atomic Energy Act and the Hyde Act other than those relating to how the agreement is approved will continue to apply to the U.S.-India agreement.

2.      It reaffirms that approval of the agreement is based on U.S. interpretations of its terms.  This relates to several issues, including the U.S. view that fuel assurances provided by President Bush are a political, rather than legally binding, commitment.

3.      It requires the President to certify that approving the agreement is consistent with the U.S. obligation under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty not to assist or encourage India to produce nuclear weapons. 

4.      Before any licenses can be issued by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission under the agreement, the bill requires that India’s safeguards agreement with the IAEA enter into force, and that India file a declaration of civilian nuclear facilities under the safeguards agreement that is not “materially inconsistent” with the separation plan that India issued in 2006. 

5.      The bill requires prompt notification to Congress if India diverges from its separation plan in implementing its safeguards agreement.

6.      The bill establishes a procedure for congressional review of any subsequent arrangement under the agreement that would allow India to reprocess spent nuclear fuel that was derived from U.S.-supplied reactor fuel or produced with U.S.-supplied equipment.  Under current law (Section 131 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954), such arrangements take effect 15 days after notice thereof is published in the Federal Register. 

7.      The bill enhances general oversight of nuclear cooperation agreements by requiring that the President keep the Foreign Relations Committee “fully and currently informed” of any initiative or negotiations on new or amended civilian nuclear cooperation agreements.

8.      The bill requires the President to certify that it is U.S. policy to work in the Nuclear Suppliers Group to achieve further restrictions on transfers of enrichment and reprocessing equipment or technology.

9.      The bill also directs the President to seek international agreement on procedures to guard against the diversion of heavy water from civilian to military programs, and requires the President to keep Congress regularly apprised of how that effort is proceeding. 

Via the China Digital Times, a worrisome tale from Taiwan:

The [state-run Radio Taiwan International] chairman and four other colleagues on the 15-member board submitted their collective resignation in the wake of news reports that the KMT government, notably the Government Information Office, and KMT lawmakers had put intense pressure on [the chairman] and RTI management to change its news and programming management.

 

According to Taiwan media reports, GIO officials cited reports by the Guangzhou-based "Global Daily" (Huanqiu shibao), an internationally-directed subsidiary of the PRC's official "People's Daily," that "the independence faction controlled the voice of Taiwan to attack Ma Ying-jeou" and called on RTI management to "make improvements."

Chilling.

Instead of fretting over tonight's debate, FP contributor and noted constitutional scholar Bruce Ackerman has a better idea: abolish the veep entirely:

This isn't a question on which the founders deserve any deference. They designed their system for a very different political world.

Their electoral college aimed to give the power to choose the president to wealthy, important men in each state. But politics was emphatically local in the 18th century, and the founders feared that each state's electors would cast their ballots for a favorite son -- depriving the leading candidate of a majority.

To solve this problem, they hit upon an ingenious scheme. The original Constitution gave presidential electors two votes, not one, and provided that they could only vote for one nominee from their own state. The idea was that electors would use one vote to flatter a local favorite and the other to select a national leader like, say, George Washington, giving him a strong majority.

But alas, the two-vote system could be sabotaged. Electors could simply vote for their favorite Joe Schmoe and cast a blank second ballot, thereby maximizing Schmoe's chance for success. Enter the vice presidency, a consolation prize for favorite sons (or whoever polled second in the electoral college). It was meant to assure the election of a proper president; providing a replacement executive was a distinctly secondary objective.

Instead of the vice president, Ackerman writes, the secretary of State could be designated to head a caretaker administration until new elections could be held.

One of the odd paradoxes of the financial crisis is that, even though it began in the United States, the dollar is actually a beneficiary of the chaos. Why's that? Because investors still see Treasury bills as the safest harbor in a financial storm, which is why yields have been pushed so low.

George Mason economist Tyler Cowen weighs in further with an interesting point about China, which holds hundreds of billions of U.S. dollars:

As for this country, the Chinese now regard us as "battle tested."  We have been through some truly major bumps, yet no major U.S. politician has called for "not paying back the Chinese."  We've even guaranteed the $350 billion in agency securities held by the Chinese central bank and without a stir. I think the Chinese are shocked by that and in many ways they now trust their investments more than before, not less. [...]

 

Bush, Bernanke, Paulson -- we call them leaders.  The Chinese think of them as the customer service department.  I suspect the Chinese get straighter answers from them than we ever do.

Top Story

Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images

The U.S. Senate easily approved the $700 billion bailout bill by a 74 to 25 margin. Both Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama and his Republican rival John McCain voted "yes."

Now, it's up to the House of Representatives to pass it after rejecting an earlier version on Monday. Here's the new draft text (pdf).

The 451-page bill contains a number of "sweeteners" designed to bring along reluctant House members. Tax provisions, such as a tax break for Hollywood studios, added more than $100 billion to the legislation's cost.

It seems to have worked. "I'm inclined to hold my nose and vote yes," said John Shadegg, an influential Republican congressman from Arizona.

"Frankly, we really don't have much flexibility, and this is important to do," added House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer.

But Texas Republican Joe Barton was less impressed. "The bailout legislation that the Senate is sending back to the House is a fraternal twin to the one I voted against on Monday — meet the new bill, same as the old bill," he complained.

"The Senate measure has changed my position from 'No' to 'Heck no,'" said Texas Democrat Lloyd Doggett.

A vote could come as early as Friday.

Economy

Warren Buffet plans to invest $3 billion in General Electric.

The auto industry is in dire straights, and new global data on manufacturing indicates that the real economy has begun to slump.

Decision '08

Obama is gaining in the polls, thanks largely to the financial crisis.

American voters are growing increasingly skeptical of McCain's running mate Sarah Palin, a new poll finds.

Americas

Mexicans working in the United States are sending home less money these days. In fact, migration to the United States is quickly slowing.

Canadian PM Stephen Harper's opponents are using George W. Bush against him.

U.S. cities are more worried about crime these days than terrorism, USA Today reports.

Asia

NATO's top commander in Afghanistan plans to step up raids on drug traffickers and the warlords who love them.

Both houses of the U.S. Congress have now passed the nuclear deal with India, to the Indian government's delight.

U.S. nuclear envoy Christopher Hill is staying in North Korea an extra day to try and rescue the six-party disarmament talks.

Middle East and Africa

Zimbabwe's economic implosion is "gaining velocity," according to the New York Times. Its food situation is "grave and deteriorating," the BBC reports.

Deadly bombs punctuated the end of Ramadan in Baghdad, killing more than 16 people.

Some fear a backlash after the Iraqi government began taking charge of Sunni "citizen patrols" Wednesday.

Europe

Heading for a deep recession, Europe is considering its own bailout package, but some European leaders are skeptical of the French-led plan.

The EU is putting together an anti-piracy force to handle Somalia.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko had to make an emergency landing, then seized his chief political rival's plane.

A report introduced in the British House of Lords calls for the legalization of cannabis.

Today's Agenda

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin debates Delaware Sen. Joe Biden in the first and only U.S. vice presidential debate. It airs at 9 p.m. ET.

Britain's surging conservatives have begun their party conference.

The International Monetary Fund publishes four chapters of its twice-annual World Economic Outlook. There will be blood.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is visiting Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in St. Petersburg.

NPR's Steve Inskeep interviews John McCain:

Senator, as you know, the vice presidential debate comes on Thursday — your running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin, against Joe Biden. Gov. Palin has been asked about her foreign policy qualifications and cited Alaska's proximity to Russia as one reason she's qualified. I'd like to ask you, senator, what specifically do you believe that Alaska's proximity to Russia adds to Palin's foreign policy qualifications?

Well, I think the fact that they have had certain relationships, but that's not the major she has stated, and you know that. The major reason she has stated is because she has the knowledge and background on a broad variety of issues, including probably the major challenge of America, and that's energy independence. And she has been responsible, taken on the oil companies, and we now are going to have a $40 billion natural gas pipeline. She has oversighted the natural gas and oil and natural resources of the state of Alaska and, by the way, quit when she saw corruption there. She has the world view that I have. She is very highly qualified and very knowledgeable.

Given what you've said, senator, is there an occasion where you could imagine turning to Gov. Palin for advice in a foreign policy crisis?

I've turned to her advice many times in the past. I can't imagine turning to Sen. Obama or Sen. Biden, because they've been wrong. They were wrong about Iraq, they were wrong about Russia. Sen. Biden wanted to divide Iraq into three different countries. He voted against the first Gulf War. Sen. Obama has no experience whatsoever and has been wrong in the issues that he's been involved in.

But would you turn to Gov. Palin?

I certainly wouldn't turn to them, and I already have turned to Gov. Palin, particularly on energy issues, and I've appreciated her background and knowledge on that and many other issues.

Does her energy qualification extend to the international energy market?

Of course, that's what it's all about. It extends to a broad variety of issues, from her world view of the threats that we face of radical Islamic extremism, to specific areas of the world. I'm very proud of her, and proud of the knowledge and background that she has. She's also been a governor of a state, and she has been involved in running a bureaucracy, she has been in charge of running a state, and it's not an accident that she's the most popular governor in America. I remember, in all due respect, that some people, when Ronald Reagan came out of California, said he was totally unqualified. I remember an obscure governor of the state of Arkansas that people said he was totally unqualified. This kind of thing goes on, usually in Georgetown cocktail parties.