Greene-fields: Richard Greene has been appointed head of the EPA's Region 6, a five-state area spanning Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Louisiana and Arkansas.

Greene, a former mayor of Arlington, TX, was the key civic official involved in negotiations with George W. Bush's Rangers for the Ballpark in Arlington. An ESPN story on Bush, written during the 2000 Presidential campaign, concluded that Greene "played on civic fears by suggesting that if voters turned down the park the Rangers might bolt for Dallas, where officials had expressed tepid interest in the team," and noted that a federal lawsuit brought against Greene for alleged criminal activities during his time as an S&L executive was dropped in exchange for a fine "12 days before the vote on the park and with passage all but assured." Today, a linear park on the Ballpark grounds is named for Greene.

Greene, currently director of the Arlington Technology Incubator, joins the EPA as a Regional Administrator with no environmental experience. Currently, all serving Administrators have significant executive or legislative experience in environmental issues, with the exception of L. John Iani of Region 10, a former executive for a seafood company.

Region 6 is facing significant environmental challenges, including water drawdown, soil depletion, industrial waste management, and air pollution. Houston, TX, is one of the most heavily-polluted cities in the nation, and is under a federal mandate to improve its air quality.

 
The yellow rosé of Texas: Texas State Rep. Wayne Christian (R-Center) has filed a bill, HB 2917, that amends the state tax code to increase the tax on "vinous liquor imported from France" to "three times the amount that would otherwise be imposed." Aside from the economic effects of literally dozens of oenophiles driving to Oklahoma and the establishment of a gray market in smuggled Bordeaux, I have trouble reconciling this proposed bill with the Supreme Court decision in Crosby v. National Foreign Trade Council, 530 U.S. 363 (2000). In any case, isn't there a war going on?

 
Strike One: Saddam Hussein appears on Iraqi television after the U.S. attack, but some Administration sources suggest it may be a body double, noting that he was wearing reading glasses. The Administration theory seems unlikely; Hussein requires glasses, but scrupulously avoids wearing them in public (his prepared speeches are printed in oversized type, with only a few lines per page, so he can read them without aid). Only the real Saddam, one surmises, would expose that particular infirmity in public, and only then in extremis, under fire and with the kind of handwritten notes he appeared to be reading from -- necessity smothers vanity. Although the White House is at least publicly dubious, journos on the intel beat say that the Community is convinced it's the real deal.

Meta-story -- First thing we do, let's ignore all the lawyers: The decisive blow against Saddam's top echelons was okayed from the White House. Although its singular importance ensured that there would be White House signoff, this also seems to reflect Administration impatience with military lawyers, who have effectively had shoot/no shoot control over military operations for the past twenty years. At least three times in the Afghan conflict, military lawyers refused to vet missile strikes on convoys and buildings believed to hold senior al-Qaeda leaders, causing commanders to stop the proposed attacks and defense officials to hit the roof. The famously control-oriented White House may have decided to take responsibility at a finer level for the invasion of Iraq, and ensure that we use every legal means possible to take out the Iraqi leadership.

Meta-story two -- Shouldn't we be losing right about now?: Everyone's talking about how well American forces are operating in the first stage: F117 bombers flew right over a Baghdad ringed with AAA and didn't even get touched; we managed to retarget and coordinate the TLAM strike in a matter of hours, something that would have taken days in the early 1990s; our forces are maneuvering in the midst of weather conditions that were supposed to make a war impossible. But according to the GOP, we shouldn't even be capable of taking Iraq, since the military was "depleted by years of Clinton/Gore neglect," as a 1999 House Republican Conference fact sheet put it. So, how is it that a lighter, more agile, more technologically-sophisticated force came out of those eight years? Or was it -- say it ain't so! -- just politics all along?

Losing traction: "Tractor Man," AKA Dwight W. Watson, who chose the worst possible time to stage a crypto-terror protest, surrendered peacefully yesterday afternoon, ensuring that the rest of his story would be buried in every paper except the Post (which relegated it to the front page of their Metro section).

Meta-story -- All along the watchtower: Although the WaPo considers the idea of placing barriers around the Mall, it seems that the media isn't asking how a mentally-disturbed man driving a tractor with an attached trailer rig managed to cruise through the Metro area and into the heart of the capital at 25 MPH. After two years of homeland defense measures, didn't someone think this was a bit strange?

Meta-story two -- Alone on the range: Watson was motivated by both his status as a tobacco farmer and as a military veteran. This seems like a good time for the media to use him as a springboard to discuss how the government is dealing with reduced revenues by limiting physical and mental health care for veterans (the House has $844 million in cuts it's considering), as well as the recent Administration move to cut $172 million, or 14%, of funding for military-district schools. Insofar as Watson's primary cause goes, it's worth noting that tobacco has in recent years been a safe harbor for farmers hit hard by the 1996 Freedom to Farm Act. The FtFA killed subsidies to farmers, but attempted to compensate by removing restrictions on how much they could grow. The predictable effect was a crop glut, depressed prices, and even more depressed farmers (rural suicide rates are up to twice as high as urban numbers). If tobacco farmers are having this much trouble, how bad is it in the heartland?

 
Oh, well, that's alright then: Even as North Korea prepares further tests of its Nodong and Taepodong missiles, it castigates Japan for working on missile defense technology:

The DPRK's missile program is of purely peaceful nature and does not pose a threat to anyone. It is the DPRK's legitimate exercise of its sovereign right to go ahead with its missile program of peaceful nature. The DPRK's armed forces show no mercy to those provoking it but it does not use force against anyone who does not hurt it.

Japanese officials are reportedly not consoled by the DPRK's statement.

American officials have told the Japanese MoD that there is substantial risk of a DPRK missile attack on Japan in the near future. North Korea is known to possess large stockpiles of sarin nerve gas, as well as blister agents and other toxins, plus the means of delivery.

Further raising tensions, the DPRK has been importing both banned and dual-use equipment and substances believed to be used in WMD programs. Last month, U.S. intelligence verified that German companies were providing North Korea with sodium cyanide, a sarin precursor chemical. (Germany is a member of the Australia Group, a voluntary coalition of states that works to impede chemical weapons development.) Rumors also have the North Koreans using domestically-produced hydrochloric acid for yellowcake processing in their nuclear weapons program.

And, yes, the first shots of the Iraq war were fired; no word yet as to which locations were targets.

 
Iridium irony: You'd think that the main problem in getting communications out of Iraq would be the lack of infrastructure, given the destruction wrought by the first Gulf War and twelve years of sanctions and intermittent airstrikes -- but it turns out that the global satellite communications net is too good; access is common enough that reporters are contending with links completely jammed by satellite phones, video uplinks and military traffic.

 
Sitting on 'G,' waiting for 'O': In the final hours before war, countries frantically attempt to realign themselves: France suggests it will support military action against Iraq if Saddam Hussein uses weapons of mass destruction (a remarkably strict standard of proof); Turkey will probably give America airspace access in a Parliamentary vote Thursday, but will disallow any use of military bases; Bahrain offers Saddam Hussein sanctuary, if he's willing to avert war by going into exile; Hosni Mubarak lays the primary blame for the upcoming war on the shoulders of Iraq; in Britain, Tony Blair gets Parliamentary support for military action, and public support for the invasion hits a high-water mark at 50%, a 100% increase from a few days ago; Saudi Arabia categorically rejects any participation in military action against what it calls "our brother Iraq" ... Dust storms in Iraq are slowing mobilization efforts as forces enter the DMZ between Iraq and Kuwait, but military officials argue that any weather problems will hit the Iraqis harder than Allied forces ... Iraqi soldiers surrender in advance of war efforts, and are taken into Kuwaiti custody ... USAT reports that Delta Force commandos and CIA operatives are already in Iraq and ready to move on Baghdad to locate and kill Saddam Hussein and other leaders of the regime ... A mass exodus of fishing boats and dhows from Iraq has been observed, as Iraqis who haven't already made plans for the invasion flee to the countryside or other nations; "hundreds" of those craft are thought to be linked with the Iraqi government, which may use them as mine-layers or platforms for terror attacks.

Sibling rivalry: Salman Pax reports that "It is being said that Barazan [al'Tikriti] (Saddam’s brother) has suggested to [Saddam Hussein] that he should do the decent thing and surrender, he got himself under house arrest in one of the presidential palaces which is probably going to be one of the first to be hit;" if true, it's only the latest, and perhaps last, manifestation of the conflict that has simmered for years between the half-brothers, provoked by Saddam's refusal of his daughter's hand, for tribal reasons, to Barazan's nephew in 1983. Barazan has also been involved in power struggles with Saddam's two sons, Uday and Qusay, over the right of succession.

This may be an attempt to weather the upcoming invasion: if he is under arrest when the 3rd Infantry Division comes pounding into Baghdad, he can't be implicated in any part of the war, and may argue for a place in the new government. (His former post as ambassador to the U.N. at Geneva also gives him some stature.) We'll know soon enough.

Ask not for whom we tell polls: A Salon headliner asks why the political left abandoned the principled opposition to tyranny that motivated groups like the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in Franco's Spain and laments that "even horrific accounts of a ruthless despot engaged in ethnic cleansing could not move [American leftists] to accept the use of U.S. military force."

In related news, the Dems are engaged in preemptive hand-wringing over public opinion on the war, trying to figure out how to steer a course between criticism and obstructionism, even as the pro-war stance of most Dem candidates is drawing the ire of their electorate. Although most Democratic analysts shudder at the thought of an anti-war candidate like Howard Dean or Nancy Pelosi going up against a GOP seen as stronger on matters of national defense, few are floating -- as of yet -- the name of retired four-star general and former SACEUR Wesley Clark, who successfully ran NATO's war in Kosovo.

 
Live from Megiddo: Rumors, war profiteering, and normalcy amongst the trenches: Salman Pax prepares for war in Baghdad

 
Forty-Eight or Fight: Bush gives a forty-eight hour ultimatum to Iraq, but sets no timetable for American military action ... Turkey reconsiders basing rights for the war, but it may be too late to stop America from arming Kurds and stopping Turkey from free maneuvers within independent Kurdistan ... likewise, the Australians are committing troops to the war despite domestic opposition; Prime Minister John Howard calls the support "in the medium and longer term interest of the country" ... the DHS changes the threat level again, raising it to high, but doesn't offer much in the way of new evidence as justification ... the FBI warns that Iraqi agents may be planning terror attacks in retaliation for the decision to go to war.

Oil prices drop as certainty of war arrives and the Saudis stock replacement oil for any war-related shortfall, but the EC forecasts price spikes as war commences.

U.N. personnel and third parties evacuate Baghdad while Iraqis stock up on food, water and guns in preparation for civil chaos.

Experts are forecasting potential pre-emptive strikes on American forces by Saddam, possibly along the lines of suicide attacks used by a Marine general playing Saddam in the recent INTERNAL LOOK wargame ... other projections include an almost certainly futile attempt to confuse American artillery by setting moats of oil ablaze around Baghdad (satellite-guided arms and high-tech imaging systems will make this more dangerous to Iraqi troops than American), opening up dams to channel and slow armor as they cross the Tigris and Euphrates, and, of course, the use of chemical weapons (with attendant heat exhaustion worries), most likely as American forces close into defended urban areas.

Iraq is expected to reprise the tactics used in the war against Iran and the first Gulf War: slow the enemy with a set of static defenses, force them to move through predefined kill zones at a crawl, and take them out; what makes this a more useful strategy than twelve years ago is that Baghdad can define where it wants to fight the battles, partially denying to Allied forces the flexibility in maneuver that made the "Hail Mary" hook and eastern feint so effective ... as well, Iraq is likely to fight in urban areas where their effectiveness will be increased: infantry are more effective, civilian shields constrict the Allies' willingness to use indirect and airborne firepower, and Allied armor can be stripped of their infantry component, rendering them more vulnerable in a context where their speed and maneuverability is drastically reduced ... a worst-case "Ozymandius scenario" is being considered by military planners, who believe that Saddam might deliberately provoke a nuclear strike on Baghdad by American or Israeli forces, outraging world opinion ... GlobalSecurity.org (managed by John Pike of the Federation of American Scientists) has a "best-guess" analysis of the American ORBAT.

 
Nous étions tous Américains: The NYT has a brief story on anti-French sentiment in Congressional cafeterias and state-run liquor stores -- even the crosses at Normandy are in peril.

However, Carboro, N.C., has declared April French Trade Month. A local alderwoman told reporters, "[W]e're sick of all this anti-French stuff, it's dumb."

Related stories from this site: more on the Iran-loving, France-hating Chairman Nye here, the first person to use the term "freedom fries," and does France really use blood in their wine?