Today's coverage: World reaction to Obama speech, and more
Here are our coverage plans today:
We're covering Obama's speech in Cairo to the Arab world from several angles.
• We've posted the full speech transcript.
• Liam Stack in Cairo has distilled the highlights of the speech.
• From Washington, Howard LaFranchi looks at the big picture of what the impact may be.
• Ilene Prusher in Jerusalem reviews the Israeli reaction. ("Obama has outlined a vision for a world that is totally different from the world Netanyahu lives in.")
• Issam Ahmed in Islamabad taps the reaction in Pakistan. ("Obama seems to know more about Islam than our own leaders.")
• Scott Peterson in Tehran pulls together the Iranian response. ("Moderates in Iran will be ecstatic with this.")
• Anna Momigliano in Milan gathers response in Italy. (“America is teaching Europe a lesson.”)
• And don't forget Albania. Besmar Likmeta reports from Tirana. (“The Muslim world has been waiting for a long time for such thing.”)
• Peter Grier in Washington is surveying the response of Jewish Americans to the speech.
In other world news ...
• Twenty years after Tiananmen Square, Peter Ford in Beijing reports that few remember who bore the brunt of the repression that followed the student protests – the state employees who supported the students.
• Peter Ford also writes on the first official mention of the Tiananmen Square events in a Chinese newspaper – twenty years after the news broke.
• Scott Peterson is in Iran as it marks the 20th anniversary of the death of Khomeini, founder of the Islamic republic.
• The surprise decision by the Organization of American States to reopen its doors to Cuba is touted as a political and diplomatic victory by both Latin America's and Washington's left. But Tim Rogers reports that Cuba and most analysts say it's unlikely to lead to a "new dawn" in US-Latin American relations or even US-Cuban relations.
• Murray Carpenter Canada is worried about the flood of guns from the US being used in crimes.
• Ben Quinn in London assesses the declining prospects for Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
In US news ...
• Mark Trumbull looks at the impact of rising mortgage rates on struggling housing sector.
• If California bans baby bottles made with BPA, will the rest of the country follow? Minnesota outlawed the substance last month, and on Tuesday a proposal to ban it passed the California assembly. A grassroots-led fight against the substance has led to proposed bans in Massachusetts, Hawaii, Illinois, and Michigan. The chemical lobby is fighting back, and the FDA has yet to draw conclusions.
• Alexandra Marks, on Sonia Sotomayor's Bronx home turf, finds pride as well as bewilderment at charges that she is a "reverse racist."
• In his latest stop on his Recession Road Trip, Bill Glauber finds a relentlessly sunny mayor in America's "coolest small town."
• Productivity is up, but worker hours are way down. Laurent Belsie blogs.