From last night’s Special Report with Brit Hume:

—On the Energy Bill—

CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: This is a product of the left wing of the Democratic Party. I love that Feinstein invoked China as a paragon here. It’s not just that they have small cars, it’s a police state. If a CEO of a company that doesn’t do what the government orders it, it is shut down, or the guy ends up in jail. . . . could end up hanged as well. I suppose the Democrats would love to have that control over the American economy.
But as Fred says, there is nothing here on production, there is nothing here about Arctic Refuge, where we could be producing a million barrels a day of American oil with the money going into the American economy. There’s nothing on nuclear. It’s not serious about lowering prices or about increasing production.
And apart from the imposing regulatory, extremely inefficient fuel efficiency standards on cars, which would probably kill off the big three American automakers, who are already near bankruptcy, this is a classic liberal free lunch. You sit in Washington and you mandate.

—On Gaza—

KRAUTHAMMER: This is the beginning of the Palestinian civil war. Round one happened this week, and it’s over. Hamas has won in Gaza, it will take it over. And it is the worst elements.
As one high administration official said the other day, these are the extreme elements of the extremists. And this is essentially the first Palestinian independent territory — Israel is out of Gaza — and it will now become a terrorist state.
And it will also be, this is extremely important, a client of Iran. Hamas is supplied and financed by Iran. Iran has now a constellation of allies and clients in that region, the way the Soviets had around the world. It’s got Hamas now in Gaza, it’s got Hezbollah in Lebanon, it’s got Sadr in Iraq. And it has a country, Syria, as its only Arab ally in that region. . . .
[I]t’s an Iranian client crescent, and it is the beginning of a general Iranian, Islamist revolutionary infiltration of the Arabs. Which is why Egypt is afraid, because Gaza has a border with Egypt, and why it’s the beginning of a great struggle between Persian, non-Arab, Shiite and radical Iran with all of these Arabs.
So it’s the beginning of a new era in the Middle East.