Today’s NYT Highlight (And Lowlights)

Little Tommy Friedman in the New York Times today here…

That is the real umbrella story in the Middle East today — the struggle for influence across the region, with America and its Sunni Arab allies (and Israel) versus Iran, Syria and their non-state allies, Hamas and Hezbollah. As the May 11 editorial in the Iranian daily Kayhan put it, “In the power struggle in the Middle East, there are only two sides: Iran and the U.S.”

For now, Team America is losing on just about every front. How come? The short answer is that Iran is smart and ruthless, America is dumb and weak, and the Sunni Arab world is feckless and divided. Any other questions?

Yes. At what point do warmongering media propagandists lose their right to utterly prostitute themselves on behalf of an amoral, ruthless and utterly incompetent executive branch in search of new conflict in an attempt to disguise its myriad failures?

Glenn Greenwald has much more here (h/t Eschaton).

And since it’s Wednesday, it’s also MoDo Day (I’ll let the legendary Bob Somerby take it from here)…

If he becomes the Dem nominee, will Obama try to win West Virginia? For better or worse, we’ll guess that he won’t. No, a Democrat doesn’t have to win the state. In 2000, Gore lost West Virginia to Bush by 6.3 points (Kerry lost it by 12.9). But he would have gone to the White House with New Hampshire, or Ohio—or with Florida. (Or with Colorado, or with Virginia—states Obama will likely contest.) But this morning, Dowd dumbly presents West Virginia as “a state [Obama] will need in the fall.”

And finally (and I kid you not, honestly), real, live, actual reporting from Elisabeth Bumiller here concerning John w. McBush…

Asked at his news conference why voters who are concerned about the environment should support him over Mr. Obama or Mrs. Clinton, Mr. McCain said that his proposal was “doable” and that his rivals “have never to my knowledge been involved in legislation nor hearings nor engagement in this issue.”

He did not mention that in 2007, Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama were co-sponsors of an emissions-curbing bill that he introduced with Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut. In addition, Mrs. Clinton went with Mr. McCain and other senators on a 2004 trip to Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago, to see the effects of global warming. Mr. McCain mentioned that journey in a speech Monday on climate change, but he did not mention that Mrs. Clinton was one of those who went along.

Read and learn, o corporate media cousins.