The Obama administration has from the start seen Syria as a leading case for engagement. Barack Obama said so during his presidential campaign (announcing he would meet Bashar al Assad without preconditions) and repeated this policy view again last summer: 

The earthquake that struck Chile on February 27 was sudden. The ground shuddered without warning. The devastation was immediate. Like all natural calamities it was random, rapid, and beyond human control.

Texas governor Rick Perry’s impressive primary victory over Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison is a signal. After the midterm election this November, the field of candidates for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012 (or later) is going to get bigger and possibly better.

At a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee last fall, Senator Chuck Grassley, Republican of Iowa, asked Attorney General Eric Holder to produce a list of Department of Justice employees who had been involved in representing detainees. Holder said he’d consider the request.