Both Cheney & Obama Deploy the US Master Narrative

May 13th, 2009 2:43 am
Cheney & Obama Deploy the US Master Narrative
The rest of the world is weary,damaged, sickened and made less safe, by the US geopolitical master narrative of the last 50 years, whether orchestrated by Cheney or Obama, or their predecessors.

This is not to imply Barack and The Dick are similar. But is Cheney the only exponent of the US master narrative?

The US master narrative is bigger and more troublesome than either individual. The more things 'change' the more they remain the same.

If Cheney is 'yelping' now, he's already been neutered so can mainstream media stop focusing on his amusing attempts to bolster his criminal legacy?

Now we have to worry about what damage Obama will do with his AfPak strategy and other implementations of the US master narrative.

President Karzai was right when he warned last week that the US had not met its own "moral standard" in its disastrous use of drones against women, children and men. It's a moral and ethical issue. Importantly, it's a matter of idealistic pragmatism. Karzai's assertion challenges the US master narrative.
But Dowd would rather focus on what a defanged, out-of-office pol has to say.

Chithra Karunakaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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New York Times copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/opinion/13dowd.html
Op-Ed Columnist
Rogue Diva of Doom
By MAUREEN DOWD
Published: May 12, 2009
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Karzai: US has not met its "moral standard" in Afghanistan

US has not met its "moral standards" in Afghanistan: Karzai
11 May 2009, 1856 hrs IST, PTI
Print Email Discuss Share Save Comment Text:
WASHINGTON: Smarting from frequent US air attacks and resultant "massive" civilian toll in his country, President Hamid Karzai has said America
has not met its "moral standard" in Afghanistan and warned that any society will be "fed up" with such "continued casualties".

"The US has not met that standard in Afghanistan. The United States must stand on a much higher moral platform in order for us together to win this war," Karzai said in an interview to NBC News.

Pressed whether the US has not met their own moral standards and was Washington waging an "immoral war" in Afghanistan, Karzai said: "No. No. It's not immoral war, it's the standard of morality that we are seeking which is also one that is being desired and spoken about in America.

"In other words, are we the same as the terrorists, are we the same as the bad guys, or are we standing on a much higher moral, moral platform? Are we better human beings or not?," Karzai said.

He insisted that "extreme care" should be taken to protect civilians "and their children and their homes" for the civilians "to see us (as) completely distinct and separate from the terrorists."

Referring to the recent US bombing in Farah district where some 100 Afghan civilians died, he noted that the incident resulted in "massive" civilian casualties.

Zardari says India "not a threat to Pakistan"

Zardari says India not a threat to Pakistan

Zardari's statement that India is not a threat to Pakistan, provides India with a credible opportunity to praise Pakistan's leadership for this long overdue,publicly stated position. India can go further and show initiative in advancing people-to-people exchanges, which suffered a serious setback on 26/11.

Now is absolutely NOT the moment to be adversarial, petty minded and cynical about Pakistan's leaders and the India Pakistan relationship. It is diplomatically in India's interest but, more important, in the interest of BOTH of our civil societies, to take Zardari at his word, and hold Zardari to his word, especially when Pakistan is being pressured by the heavy-handed military and anti-civilian tactics of the US.

Nothing will change the fact that the US is the state sponsor of terror in the South Asian region and that since the early 50's, the US has manipulated and exploited Pakistan, weakened by Brit-driven Partition in 1947. Divide and Rule is an especially effective weapon of both colonial and neo-imperial strategy. Indians & Pakistanis (together w/Afghans) have to find every possible way to defeat US designs in the region.
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Times of India copyright
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/World/Pakistan/India-not-a-threat-Zardari/articleshow/4504948.cms
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The US Hand in Pakistan & Afghanistan

#49. May 9, 2009 10:45 am Link

The US Hand in Pakistan & Afghanistan

It is disturbing but predictable that Mackey, Filkins and Cowell would file articles and blog posts that hide the US hand in the vast internal displacement of Pakistanis within their own homeland. Despite their claims of objectivity, their job is in accordance with the diktat of the Obama administration and Congress. The Pakistani Government, a hapless stooge of the US since the days of John Foster Dulles, is cynically sacrificing its own people, in order to stay in power and make a quick profit with a US handout.

The Pakistani people will not see a dime of that money.

Mackey is engaging in a clever theoretical exercise by comparing two ‘counterinsurgencies’ one in Sri Lanka one in Pakistan. But this is not Political Theory 101 for some Ivy League course. There is Af-Pak blood on US hands.

The flight from Swat and Buner is a TRAGEDY for the Pakistani people and Pashtun refugees created by earlier US action.

The insurgents against US invasion,occupation and militarization can all be conveniently lumped together by US-based media as THE TALIBAN or AL QUEDA. But it is clear that the local inhabitants of both Afghanistan and Pakistan are resisters against US and US-led NATO who are physically on the ground and in the air of their homeland, killing civilians.

This resistance can only grow stronger till the US and US led NATO vacate the region. That resistance will be a good thing for nation-building for both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Their peoples are to be commended, not labeled and theorized as insurgents/terrorists.

That said, I continue to read and pay attention to the points raised by Mackey, Filkins et al. We have a profound disagreement.
Chithra KarunaKaran
City University of New York
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LEDE BLOGGER RESPONSE: You won’t be surprised that I disagree strongly with your reading that anything written by myself or my colleagues is done “in accordance with the diktat” of the U.S. government, but we will have a blog post about Pakistani views of American media coverage later today which will deal with this sort of reading of our coverage in detail.
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New York Times copyright
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/08/a-tale-of-two-counterinsurgencies-in-pakistan-and-sri-lanka/?apage
May 8, 2009, 12:08 pm
Pakistan and Sri Lanka, a Tale of Two Counterinsurgencies
By Robert Mackey
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Associated Press copyright
Desperation in Pakistani hospitals, refugee camps
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090509/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan
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Pak Feudal Billionaires and US Militarism

Comment #333. May 9, 2009 12:52 am Link

Pak Feudal Billionaires and US Militarism

Zardari, feudal landowner and billionaire is in Washington with a begging bowl in his hand. He is being turned into a total US stooge.

The money that he gets as a bribe from the US will never reach the suffering people of Pakistan, now desperate refugees in their own country. Pakistan is attacking its own people. The Pakistani people will never forgive their current leaders for this assault, and they will be forced to turn more and more to the multiple factions of the Taliban and the tribal chieftains.
This attack on the Pakistani people, at the relentless prodding of the US, is predictably the beginning of a new phase in Pakistan’s violent and troubled history.

Pakistan, weakened by Partition in 1947, and fed a steady diet of hate by their corrupt leaders, against India (which has more Muslims than Pakistan) has been manipulated and exploited by the US since the early 50’s.

This is a tragic state of affairs for the Pakistani people whom I regard as my sisters and brothers.

Chithra Karunakaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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NYTimes copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/09/world/asia/09pstan.html?ref=global-home
Pakistan Pounds Taliban, Swelling the Tide of Refugees
Pakistanis arriving Friday at a refugee camp in Mardan, in the North-West Frontier Province, after fleeing the Buner district.

By DEXTER FILKINS
====================================================================================
Published: May 8, 2009

NUCLEAR, not Diplomatic, 'Disconnect' between US and Pak

My published NYT comment #83.
May 07, 2009 5:13 pm

Link


May 07, 2009 3:53 pm
US-Pak NUCLEAR not Diplomatic 'Disconnect'

What we have is not merely a diplomatic disconnect. That's small potatoes, talk is cheap.

What the entire world is faced with is a NUCLEAR 'disconnect' in which the US and NATO have not so far reassured and convinced the world that Pak's warheads are 100% secure. Nothing less that a 100% guarantee will do. This is extremely serious. Everything else pales into insignificance.

Why is the IAEA silent? Why is el-Baradei dumbstruck on this issue? Why does the world not have a guarantee from the IAEA that Pakistan's warheads are fully secured and under continuous IAEA surveillance?

The US will never act in the best interests of the Pakistani people. The US will never act in the best interests of the Afghan people. Afghans and Pakistanis, Indians and Sri Lankans, Bangladeshis and Nepalis and Maldivians know this in their hearts.
Pakistanis especially are being humiliated (even as they are bribed) by the US in this 50 year master-stooge relationship. Pakistan has not thrived under a half-century of US domination and manipulation.

The diverse peoples of South Asia are related by blood and history. It is up to us South Asians, despite centuries of Brit divide and rule colonial strategy, to work together in fellowship and cooperation. Pakistanis have to vomit the hate propaganda they have been fed by their feudal elites to keep them servile, hungry, poor and with no prospects for employment except as suicide bombers and terrorists. And India must help and respect Pakistan in the spirit of sisterhood for the sake of every woman, child and man in our South Asia region.

Pakistanis, Indians and Afghans are closer to each other than they can ever be to Saudi Arabia, Iran, Russia, China or the US. That's a fact.

Chithra Karunakaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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NYTimes copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/08/us/politics/08cooper.html
On the White House: In Diplomacy, a Pakistan Disconnect
By HELENE COOPER
As American and Pakistani diplomats met, there was a gap between the sentiments expressed in public and those voiced in private.

How John Yoo Became White & Learned to Perform Whiteness

How did John Yoo become white? How did John Yoo learn to perform Whiteness?

John Yoo, the law professor at Berkeley, a US-born citizen played a key role, along with Judge Jay Bybee of the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, in crafting the legal argument underlying the 'torture memos' of the Bush administration.

The US system of Whiteness is the core ideology of the state - a set of beliefs which makes possible the exercise of racialized, supremacist, dominant POWER at home and around the globe. Because this set of beliefs originating with white male supremacists, including the so-called Founding Fathers, is so entrenched it shapes the thoughts and actions of everyone, no matter what their racial membership, their ethnicity, social class,religion, gender, age, sexual orientation.

see my Theory of Systemic Whiteness on this Blog. Itmay help to clarify how a Chinese American, a person of color, became a recruit into the US Whiteness System.
If we want to remain progressive and ethical, we have to exercise vigilance accompanied by critical thinking in order to prevent ourselves from being unwittingly recruited into Whiteness.
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Associated Press copyrightes article
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090507/ap_on_re_us/ca_interrogation_memos
Bush attorneys who wrote terror memo face backlash
AP


File - In this June 26, 2008 file photo John Yoo, a law professor at the AP – File - In this June 26, 2008 file photo John Yoo, a law professor at the University of California at …

* No charges seen over interrogation memos Play Video Video:No charges seen over interrogation memos AP
* Bush era memos on waterboarding released Play Video Video:Bush era memos on waterboarding released AP
* Interrogation Memos Play Video Video:Interrogation Memos FOX News

By TERENCE CHEA, Associated Press Writer Terence Chea, Associated Press Writer – Wed May 6, 9:21 pm ET

SAN FRANCISCO – Pressure is mounting against two former Bush administration attorneys who wrote the legal memos used to support harsh interrogation techniques that critics say constituted torture. John Yoo, a constitutional law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, is fighting calls for disbarment and dismissal, while Judge Jay Bybee of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals faces calls for impeachment.

Justice Department investigators have stopped short of recommending criminal charges, but suggest in a draft report that the two men should face professional sanctions. A number of groups across the country agree, and some want even stronger action.

"We believe there is a lot of evidence to suggest that war crimes were committed," said Laura Bonham, deputy director of the Progressive Democrats of America, a group dedicated to rebuilding the Democratic Party. "We believe the memos provided the Central Intelligence Agency with the cover they needed to begin torturing detainees for information."

Bybee and Yoo worked in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel following the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and played key roles in crafting the legal justification for the interrogation techniques.

The draft report from an internal Justice Department inquiry sharply criticizes Yoo and Bybee and recommends referring their cases to state bar associations for possible disciplinary actions, a person familiar with the inquiry said. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the inquiry.

Action was not recommended against a third lawyer, Steven Bradbury, who was head of the office at the time the memos were created, a person familiar with the inquiry said. The person, who also was not authorized to publicly discuss the investigation, said investigators found that Bradbury played a lesser role in the creation of the memos. Bradbury is now in private practice.

The recommendations come after an Obama administration decision last month not to prosecute CIA interrogators who followed advice outlined in the memos.

The long-awaited report is still in draft form and subject to revisions. Attorney General Eric Holder also may make his own determination about what steps to take once the report has been finalized.

Yoo's attorney, Miguel Estrada, would not comment, citing an agreement with the Justice Department not to discuss the case. Bybee's attorney, Maureen Mahoney, did not return a message seeking comment Wednesday.

But at a forum last month on the campus of Chapman University School of Law where Yoo is visiting professor, he defended his role in establishing the legal rationale for using waterboarding and other severe interrogation techniques.

"Three thousand of our fellow citizens had been killed in a deliberate attack by a foreign enemy," Yoo told a packed audience on the Southern California campus, according to the Los Angeles Times. "That forced us in the government to have to consider measures to gain information using presidential constitutional provisions to protect the country from further attack."

"Was it worth it?" he asked, brushing off hecklers. "We haven't had an attack in more than seven years."

John Eastman, dean of the Chapman law school, defended the memos.

"He wrote a comprehensive legal analysis of a gray area of the law," Eastman said. "I think John's legal analysis taps into the founders' understanding of the executive."

Yoo, 41, who worked for the Justice Department from 2001 to 2003, has drawn intense criticism and protests since his role in the interrogation memos became public in 2004.

In December, the Berkeley City Council, known for wading into politically charged national and international issues, passed a measure urging the federal government to prosecute Yoo for war crimes.

Human rights and anti-war activists are planning a demonstration at the Berkeley School of Law's May 16 commencement ceremony to press for Yoo to be fired.

"It's unconscionable that the legal architect of the torture apparatus is teaching the future generation of lawyers and judges at UC Berkeley," said Stephanie Tang, an organizer with the group World Can't Wait.

Robert Cole, a professor emeritus at Berkeley's law school, said he believes the university should conduct its own investigation to determine if Yoo's work for the Bush administration violated the campus' faculty code of conduct.

"The university has got to protect its integrity," Cole said. "Every professor we put in the classroom has to have professional competence and ethical integrity."

California Attorney General Jerry Brown, a likely Democratic candidate for governor, said the memos raised questions about whether Yoo should be allowed to teach law at UC Berkeley and called for a full accounting.

"This is not something that should be swept under the rug," he said.

Christopher Edley Jr., Berkeley's law school dean, has rejected calls to dismiss Yoo and says the university doesn't have the expertise or resources to conduct an investigation involving classified intelligence. A tenured professor would have to be convicted of a crime that demonstrates unfitness to be a faculty member to be dismissed by the university.

"Assuming one believes as I do that Professor Yoo offered bad ideas and even worse advice during his government service, that judgment alone would not warrant dismissal or even a potentially chilling inquiry," Edley said in a statement. He added that Yoo "remains a very successful teacher and prolific (but often controversial) scholar."

In Nevada, debate over Bybee's role has been more muted, largely playing out on the opinion pages and among his colleagues at the William S. Boyd School of Law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Bybee taught constitutional and administrative law and civil procedure from 1999 until 2001 and remains on the faculty.

Legal colleagues, while praising Bybee as a scholar and caring colleague, have criticized the memos, particularly for what some of them say was legal sloppiness and faulty constitutional logic not indicative of his other work.

John Podesta, president of the liberal Center for American Progress and the leader of President Barack Obama's transition team, said, "If he would do the right thing, he should just simply resign."

If he doesn't quit, Podesta said, he should be removed from office.

Nevada Republican Sen. John Ensign, who with Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., sponsored Bybee for the federal judgeship, has defended him and said calls for his impeachment were "outrageous."

"To call for him to be impeached when he was trying to give the proper legal advice is just ridiculous," Ensign told the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Reid, who has said he was disturbed by the memos, has taken a wait and see attitude.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., a member of the House Judiciary Committee, said impeachment was a "possibility a little down the road," but said he first wanted to see the pending Justice Department report.

He said if the report indicates "Bybee violated professional ethics, we'll have to see whether a special counsel is appointed and the impeachment issue will come after that."

____

Associated Press Writers Paul Elias in San Francisco, Tom Tait in Las Vegas, and Devlin Barrett and Larry Margasak in Washington contributed to this report.

US State-sponsored Terror -- with Apologies

My published NYT COMMENT #98.
May 06, 2009 2:12 pm

Link

May 6th, 2009 1:41 pm
US State-Sponsored Terror -- with Apologies
Talk is cheap -- your apology means nothing, Secretary Clinton, you too President Obama and the rest of the White House/State Dept. crew.

Pashtun civilians are dying and we know who is causing the deaths. Wake up and smell the acrid odor of burning flesh in a drone airstrike, America.

The US is engaged in state-sponsored terror in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area of the South Asia region

Remember the US trained, armed and paid the Mujahideen to fight the Cold War(invented by the US), with the Soviets in the 80's.

Now those same Mujahideen have become the Taliban. Historically, Pashtuns (now Mujahideen and Taliban) have never tolerated invaders and occupiers on their soil. They taught the Brits a bitter lesson during the colonial period. Then the Soviets got a 9-year taste of Pashtun medicine. Now it's the turn of the Americans to learn the same bitter bloody lesson.

But who's paying the price? Innocent women, children and men who live in the westernmost part of my South Asia region.
And who's footing the bill? The US taxpayer, me.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy as Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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NYT copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/world/asia/07afghan.html?_r=1
High Civilian Toll Seen in U.S. Raid in Afghanistan
By CARLOTTA GALL and TAIMOOR SHAH

The Red Cross said dozens died, but Afghan officials put the toll at more than 100, offering a grim backdrop to a U.S. visit by the Afghan and Pakistani leaders on Wednesday

Russia's Role in the New Global Order of Competing Fundamentalisms

The US Whiteness system which has its origins in slavery and genocide for profit, is strongly ideological while posturing as progressive, pragmatic and ethical. This is the core ideological system in which Obama performs Whiteness. I voted for Obama because I clearly understood he is the lesser of two evils within the US Whiteenss System of racialized dominant power based on extreme exloitative profit.

Who armed, trained and paid the Mujahideen who morphed into the Taliban? The US has been a state sponsor of terror throughout the world for over 50 years. Its latest military adventurism, along with US led-NATO, is in my region of South Asia. The US is seeking strategic depth" in South Asia in order to counter Russia and Iran while continuing satellization of Israel. All three adjoin the South Asia region, which the US is cultivating as the main theater of US geopolitical operations.

But fingerpointing at the US does not absolve each nation-state. We each have to do whatever we can to promote social and economic justice in the world for the billions of our fellow citizens of earth. This requires ethical thinking and practice over strategic thinking thinking and practice.

We need idealistic pragmatism that demonstrably promotes prosperity under conditions of peace for the billions of hungry, diseased and homless in our world today.

Russia has to do considerably more by developing a visibly open society (look at India) that takes a more responsive and responsible place in the world.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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Russia today copyright
http://russiatoday.com/Politics/2009-05-06/Taliban_Rising__Pakistan_swaps_mountain_skiing_for_strict_Sharia_law.html

US: State Sponsor of Terror In South Asia Region

Comment #84. May 6, 2009 4:46 am Link
US: State Sponsor of Terror In South Asia Region

What's new? The US is the chief irritant and instigator of instability in my South Asia region.
The US is a state-sponsor of terror in the South Asia region.
So:

Get out.

Stop droning and killing civilians. That's terror.

How dare the US 'invite' Saudi Arabia, that pillar of democracy and proponent of wahabbism, into the region.

Pakistan's weakly resurgent democracy has not been given a chance to work, by the US and US-led NATO.

Do not give Pakistan military aid, but do give Pakistan civil society assistance, though international and local NGOs.

The sovereign nation-states of the South Asia region will have to work this out among themselves. They have the capability to do so.

Both the IAEA and the UN's several agencies can and must take a more comprehensive role. They are impeded by the US seat in the UN Security Council.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com

p.s Among your panel of so-called experts, why don't you have one each from Pakistan and Afghanistan?

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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NYTimes copyright
http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/05/pakistan-scenarios-us-solutions/
Room For Debate
May 5, 2009, 5:39 pm
Pakistan’s Nuclear Scenarios, U.S. Solutions
By The Editors
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Loose Cannon Diplomacy: US Style

My published NYT comment #30.
May 05, 2009 3:03 pm

Link


May 5th, 2009 2:39 pm
Loose Cannon Diplomacy: US style

The US is a loose cannon in the South Asia region. It has been that way for over 50 years, particularly in regard to Pakistan, which became a victim of US Cold War geopolitical machinations, beginning with the Dulles-era of the State Department. We are seeing a continuation of that same loose cannon diplomacy from the Obama White House.

It would be a total mistake to conclude that the US has any interest in the South Asia region other than a narrowly defined, ad hoc, frequently shifting strategic interest. Therefore no real attempt to invest in the civil societies of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The latest twist in this story, that David Sanger does not mention in his article, is that Robert Gates is now calling upon Saudi Arabia, that pillar of Democracy, to assist US policy with Pakistan. Isn't Saudi money financing wahabbism in the madrassh and providing weaponry to the factions on the border? Great move, Gates and crew.

Will Pakistan become Obama's Vietnam? Sure looks like it. My sympathy goes out to the civil societies of both Afghanistan and Pakistan. They are paying the price for egregious missteps in US policy in South Asia. They and the US taxpayer.

Chithra Karunakaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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New York Times copyright
On Washington: Pakistan Overshadows Afghanistan on U.S. Agenda
By DAVID E. SANGER
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/06/us/politics/05web-sanger.html

Important as Afghanistan is to the U.S., the events of the past few weeks have focused American minds on the risks to Pakistan’s stability.
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Horror Terror Torture: The American Way

My published comment #102.
May 03, 2009 10:27 am
Link
May 3rd, 2009 0:10 am

Horror Terror Torture: The American Way

Q. Is torture by waterboarding to be set apart and conveniently isolated from the "banality of evil" of US foreign policy?

Q. Was "shock and awe" mass torture?

Q. Are today's drone raids that routinely kill civilians in Swat fly-by torture?

Q. Shall we continue to make convenient comforting distinctions between horror, terror, torture in US nation-state relations?

Maureen Dowd focuses on waterboarding torture as one example of Republican leaders' character corrosion. But really, is it just about torture or more broadly about the aforesaid 'banality of evil' in the US national political character? Is this corrosiveness a Condi-tion found just in Republicans of the Bush-Cheney era or widely distributed throughout the Beltway and beyond? That banality of evil is represented by the US nation-state, in which horror, terror, torture at the existential level, are inseparable. Ask the bleached bones at Hiroshima, the napalm burned skin in Vietnam all the way to today.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
-------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/05/03/opinion/03dowd.html
Op-Ed Columnist: How Character Corrodes
By MAUREEN DOWD

The Republicans new-found concerns about checks and balances is touching, given what the Bush administration did to undermine the process.
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A Language & Practice of Earth Justice

My published NYT comment #54.
May 02, 2009 6:43 pm

Link

May 2nd, 2009 10:51 am
A Language & Practice of Earth Justice

This NYT article (see link listed below) mistakenly takes a top-down approach to Earth Justice (preferable in my view, to "conservation") by focusing on EcoAmerica, a corporate consultancy that basically is in cahoots with the Beltway.

As a participatory citizen in Democracy, whether in India or the US, I don't rely on govt, or its corporate clients, both of whom are major polluters. However I do hold these two powerful entities accountable, (with my activism and my ballot), for their policy and implementation priorities.

Instead of a top-down approach, we need a wide ranging grassroots level daily accountability from ordinary folks like me. For example, you and I can and must exercise an obligation to:

1) use less

2) recycle more

3) leave a measurably smaller footprint on the earth, on which we live, for a glorious but transient moment.

The US is undoubtedly the most wasteful and most avaricious user and disposer of resources of any nation-state on earth. All the self-promoting politicized jargon developed by EcoAmerica will not change that one iota. Unless WE, the People, do.

I'll give an example. I work at a huge urban public university. This university doesn't even have a simple directive mandating everybody on their campuses from the President to the freshman student, to print on both sides of their paper. The uni. refuses to even set their thousands of printers to print on both sides of a page. Multiply that reckless waste a hundred-thousand-fold across the university systems of America.
I once suggested double-sided printing in a memo (which I still have in my email) to my college president, but the idea, while lauded on paper (yes, more paper) predictably fell by the wayside. The conservation directive was never issued.

Education or information or 'new' language as EcoAmerica wastefully purports to do, doesn't change anything if that knowledge does not impact our lived practice in this Earth we share.

Chithra Karunakaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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New York Times copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/02/us/politics/02enviro.html?scp=1&sq=EcoAmerica&st=cse
Seeking to Save the Planet, With a Thesaurus
By JOHN M. BRODER
Published: May 1, 2009
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Heredity, Environment & Genius

My NYT Comment #329.
May 01, 2009 4:19 pm

Link

May 1st, 2009 11:13 am
Heredity, Environment and Genius

There is a dynamic interplay between heredity and environment, to produce ABILITY, whether average, mediocre or at the so-called genius level. I would have liked to see included in Brooks' discussion, the 'outlier' factor developed by Malcolm Gladwell.

Part of the crucial role of environment is ACCESS to:

1.Goods (example a spinet or a Steinway)

2. Resources (a parent, a mentor)

3. Social capital -- what-you-know-is-as-important-as-who-you-know.

It also helps if you are not partly impeded by social location -- as a member of an oppressed minority or suffer other deeply stratified setbacks resulting from intolerance, bias and hatred.

On a geopolitical level, ability rising to the 'genius' level probably cannot be fostered under brutal imposition of "shock and awe."

Can SOCIAL JUSTICE cultivate more "geniuses"?
That would be a research enterprise worthy of us all.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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NYTimes copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/01/opinion/01brooks.html
Op-Ed Columnist: Genius: The Modern View
By DAVID BROOKS
The latest research suggests a more prosaic, democratic, even puritanical take on great accomplishment. It’s not I.Q., but deliberate practice.
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Aid Pakistan's Civil Society, Not Pak Military

My published NYT Comment #1
May 01, 2009 8:30 am
Link
May 1st, 2009 8:13 am

Aid Pakistan's Civil Society, Not Pak Military

So now, it's not AfPak or PakAf but AllPak.

Hope the aid (through UN agencies and NGO) is all humanitarian, example development of infrastructure for schools and hospitals and a complete halt to drone strikes, which fuel Taliban and civilian recruitment and aggression.

The fewer foreign forces on the ground, the better.

However, the US still doesn't get it. The US must abandon its arbitrary, profit-oriented, self-appointed GlobalCop interventions.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Pratice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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NYTimes Copyright
News Analysis: Now, U.S. Sees Pakistan as a Cause Distinct From Afghanistan
By MARK LANDLER and ELISABETH BUMILLER
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/01/world/asia/01policy.html
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The Banality of 'Evil' in US Foreign Policy

My published NYTimes comment # 273.
April 26, 2009 11:43 am

Link


April 26th, 2009 9:58 am
The Banality of Bush & Obama White House Evil

"The Banality of Bush White House Evil" is being continued and it is cut from the same cloth, as Obama's daily drone raids in the western areas of the South Asia region. The plan to send tens of thousands more troops into South Asia will undoubtedly exacerbate that evil, make it more banal -- until we recoil from it, usually too late.

What makes Obama's drones banal is that they have become part of the everyday operations of the US in my region. The drones kill, maim, terrify innocents and they unleash the pathological anger, fear and violence of the Taliban who were, lest we forget, the Mujahideen of the Soviet-era 80's, trained and armed by the US with its allies:
1) Suadi Arabia, that pillar of Democracy,
2)a US-weakened Pakistan
3)warlord factions in Afghanistan.

Clearly, evil then, is socially constructed and cumulative, as we can see from two administrations touted as 'different' in style and substance. (I never voted for either of the Bush(es) and I did vote for Obama knowing I was voting for the lesser of the two evils). Obama is at least (still) open to persuasion and humane logical reasoning.

The sense that something or someone is Evil carries a complex, evolved set of emotions like horror and revulsion (even reflexes like gagging).We evolved to agree to define evil as pathological and antisocial, capable of crimes against our species. That sense that evil exists was essential, so that we could persevere in building social groups on the basis of cooperation and collaboration, rather than sadistic annihilation.

I get the sense from this article that torture behavior is somehow to be set apart. But it is part of the horror repertoire of military adventurism in the 50+ year context of White House evil from Nixon to Obama.

Of course a history of slavery and genocide as earlier banalities of evil helps us to understand the current context.

Can we persevere to move past evil? Yes we can.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http:EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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New York Times copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/26/opinion/26rich.html?em
Op-Ed Columnist: The Banality of Bush White House Evil
By FRANK RICH

Torture was a tool in the campaign to exploit 9/11 so that fearful Americans would support a war that had nothing to do with Al Qaeda.
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http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/26/opinion/26rich.html?s=1&pg=11
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Schemas Stereotypes & the Evolved Ethical Self

April 26th, 2009 0:42 am
"Snap judgments" that help us assess social situations(example 'frumpy' Susan Boyle singing with a wonderful voice) are not "natural" as your subhead states, they're evolutionary.

Our mind-brains have EVOLVED over millennia, to acquire and construct SCHEMAS -- a useful, time-conserving, energy-conserving mental shorthand to group or categorize (stereotype)information about the world we live in -- the social world; all of nature; as well as all the objects and entities of our material culture.

We build stereotypes not only about people, but about about things, and even about what cannot be proven to exist, example God. Therefore, religion.

This capacity to categorize conveniently into schemas is essential to our survival as a species. We rely on our schemas, even when presented with conflicting information (plain women can have unique singing talent).

Do I have a useful, convenient, efficient stereotype about The New York Times? Yes I do!

Of all the experts you quoted in your article, the least useful, most limiting, for understanding stereotypes is the one advanced by Berreby in his Us and Them.

Our schemas (stereotypes), whether about singing sensations like Boyle or 11 year old Shaheen Jaffargholi or about garbage or Congress (!) help us to re-assess previously held ideas (which help us generate new schemas) without necessarily developing an insider-outsider binary. I don't have to be for or against Susan Boyle, see her as an outsider or insider, to maintain a schema about plain women who may (or may not) sing extraordinarily well.
One schema tells us Looks do Matter but another schema counteracts with Appearances are Deceptive.

Both are useful, convenient, effective navigational tools as we daily find our way in the world.



Chithra KarunaKaran
City University of New York
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
------------------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
Yes, Looks Do Matter
By PAM BELLUCK
Published: April 24, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/26/fashion/26looks.html
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The Emerging Sovereign Nation-State of TalibanPakistan

My Lede NYTimes Comment #72. April 24, 2009 5:16 pm Link

April 24th, 2009 8:56 am

The Emerging Sovereign Nation-State of TalibanPakistan

Pakistan has neither Motivation nor Reason to stop the Taliban. Why would they?

I analyze 3 reasons why Pakistan current leaders and civil society will accommodate and unite with the Taliban.

1. So long as the Taliban is perceived as a threat to Pakistan, MONEY and WEAPONS keep flowing into Pakistan from interested parties like the US, Saudi Arabia and Iran. This money and arms are used by feudal elites (this includes the ruling political leaders)to create cash liquidity, maintain power and control over land and other resources.

2. It is possible to envisage a scenario in which the Taliban rule Pakistan through a coalition with the feudal landowners who now rule Pakistan. That coalition will keep Pakistan securely within the fold of repressive nation-states like Saudi Arabia, who have the substantial longstanding support of the US. Everybody knows that Democracy is NOT a US export item.

3. Pakistan's very existence as a nation-state is entirely defined by its separation,in 1947, from India. mainly through Brit divide-and-rule imperial strategy. Pakistan can therefore continue to maintain its 60+ years of a nation-state political orientation in which India can continue to be portrayed to its civil society, as The Enemy, the Infidel, the Unbeliever. This view is wholly consistent with the Taliban's view of India.
The US can do virtually nothing to alter the Pakistan-Taliban dynamic. The US appears ready to consolidate and inflame that dynamic through additional troop deployment and ongoing drone strikes.
Let us also not forget that the US created, armed and trained the mujahideen who morphed into the Taliban.

The US policy in South Asia constitutes the gravest threat to the world's largest democracy, India. But India will likely rise to that threat, no thanks to the US.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice

The Emerging Misogynist Sovereign Nation-State of TalibanPakistan

The US policy in South Asia constitutes the gravest threat to the world’s largest democracy, India. The Taliban threat is nothing compared with the threat posed by the presence of US and US-led NATO troops.

To focus on the comment about white US female soldiers, is to give undue importance to the Taliban’s views on women which are already well known (they are proven arch misogynists), and to deflect attention from the Paksitan Govt’s role:

Pakistan has neither Motivation nor Reason to stop the Taliban. Why would they?

I analyze 3 reasons why Pakistan current leaders and civil society will accommodate and unite with the Taliban.

1. So long as the Taliban is perceived as a threat to Pakistan, MONEY and WEAPONS keep flowing into Pakistan from interested parties like the US, Saudi Arabia and Iran. This money and arms are used by feudal elites (this includes the ruling political leaders)to create cash liquidity, maintain power and control over land and other resources.

2. It is possible to envisage a scenario in which the Taliban rule Pakistan through a coalition with the feudal landowners who now rule Pakistan. That coalition will keep Pakistan securely within the fold of repressive nation-states like Saudi Arabia, who have the substantial longstanding support of the US. Everybody knows that Democracy is NOT a US export item.

3. Pakistan’s very existence as a nation-state is entirely defined by its separation,in 1947, from India. mainly through Brit divide-and-rule imperial strategy. Pakistan can therefore continue to maintain its 60+ years of a nation-state political orientation in which India can continue to be portrayed to its civil society, as The Enemy, the Infidel, the Unbeliever. This view is wholly consistent with the Taliban’s view of India.
The US can do virtually nothing to alter the Pakistan-Taliban dynamic. The US appears ready to consolidate and inflame that dynamic through additional troop deployment and ongoing drone strikes.
Let us also not forget that the US created, armed and trained the mujahideen who morphed into the Taliban.

Let me repeat: The US policy in South Asia constitutes the gravest threat to the world’s largest democracy, India. The Taliban threat is nothing compared to the threat posed by the ground and air presence of US and US-led NATO convoys, troops and drones. It will predictably get worse when US tr0ops are redeployed from Iraq to Pakistan-Afghanistan border areas.

However, India will likely assess and overcome the Taliban threat, absolutely no thanks to the US. India overturned Brit colonialism now it will dismantle US neo-imperialism and defuse the Taliban reaction to US militarism, male and female, in their homeland.

Chithra KarunaKaran
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NYTimes copyright
U.S. Questions Pakistan’s Will to Stop Taliban
By CARLOTTA GALL and ERIC SCHMITT
Published: April 23, 2009
Taliban militants on Thursday outside a mosque where tribal elders and members of the Taliban met in Daggar, the main town in the Buner district of Pakistan.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/world/asia/24pstan.html
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/24/world/asia/24pstan.html
----------------------
The Lede NYTimes copyright
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/video-of-pakistani-taliban-in-buner-and-swat/?apage=3#comments
April 24, 2009, 7:43 am
Taliban Spokesman Blames American Women
By Robert Mackey

Cheney the Exceptionalist Individualist

My published NYT comment#151.
April 24, 2009 10:51 am

Link

April 24th, 2009 8:20 am
Cheney the Exceptionalist Individualist

US nation-state culture, from the perspective of the social sciences, can accurately be categorized as:

individualistic vs. collectivistic; independent vs. interdependent.

Such a nation-state culture can and does frequently produce individuals (whether Dick Cheney the statist or Charles Manson the sadist) who focus mainly on their own private, narrow, often violent and even pathological self-interest, to the exclusion of the collective and interdependent self-interest.

Cheney represents the most extreme, radical and self-absorbed example of US nation-state culture.

That personal and nation-state cultural orientation is a threat to the individual, the society and the world.

Is it possible for US nation-state culture to produce fewer Cheneys in the future?
This one still has a few more years of destruction left in him.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
---------------------------
New York Times copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/us/24cheney.html?scp=1&sq=Cheney%20unapologetic&st=cse
Unemployed, Unapologetic and Unrestrained: It’s Cheney Unbound
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
Published: April 23, 2009
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/24/us/24cheney.html?s=1&pg=7

Koran Gone Wild or US Foreign Policy Gone Wild?

My comment #96.
April 23, 2009 1:21 pm

Link


April 23rd, 2009 8:16 am
Koran Gone Wild OR US Foreign Policy Gone Wild?

Mainly, a 60-year US policy and on-the-ground intervention, dispossession and dislocation in areas where the majority of Muslims live and pray, has unleashed "fundamentalism" and "extremism".

This POLITICAL dimension simply cannot be ignored, deflected or underplayed. It is the root of the current social chaos in Muslim-majority nation-states.

The fact is Bush-Cheney "fundamentalism" and "extremism", which killed thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians, produced the suicide bombings in Iraq.

Today, the "fundamentalism" and "extremism" of Obama's daily drone strikes and the military adventurism of the US-led NATO forces on the ground in Afghanistan and Pakistan are producing the incursion of Taliban (who were the mujahideen of the Soviet-US Afghan era)into Swat and now Buner.

The entire DIVERSE Muslim world is paying for the POLITICAL missteps of the New Crusades undertaken by the US.

These problems do not lie, nor have their origins in literal or non-literal interpretations of the Koran.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com

— EthicalDemocracy, New York & Chennai
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/opinion/23kristof.html
Op-Ed Columnist
Islam, Virgins and Grapes
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Published: April 22, 2009
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/23/opinion/23kristof.html#postComment

Tamil Civil Society vs the LTTE: The Challenge for Sri Lanka's Tamils

22. April 21, 2009 12:16 am Link
My published comment #22. April 21, 2009 12:16 am
Tamils vs. the LTTE
The LTTE anti-nationalist rebels, under the murderous Vellupalli Prabhakaran, have conducted terror for 50+ years, and they must now surrender to Sri Lanka forces. They must allow innocent Tamil civilians to leave the embattled area and not be held as human shields by the LTTE forces.

The LTTE do not represent Tamil interests. Tamils can live peacefully in Sri Lanka. They are a part of Sri Lanka,

The Sri Lanka Govt. must accord equal opportunity in jobs, housing, healthcare, education, to minority ethnic Tamils. The SL govt. cannot discriminate against this important and long suffering ethnic and linguistic minority.

The Sri Lanka Govt. was impolitic and deeply unfair to declare Sinhala as the national language. They could have easily given co-equal recognition to both Tamil and Sinhala. The SL govt erected language as a political barrier to keep Tamils from maintaining their distinct Tamil ethnicity and culture and more important, jobs and other economic and political opportunities.

ALL religions, ethnicities and languages must be equally respected by the SL govt. if Sri Lanka is to continue to prosper as a modern pluralistic sovereign nation-state. A strong, democratic, secular, pluralist Sri Lanka would contribute to the stability and solidarity of the South Asia region, which is under threat from extra-state terrorism (Taliban) as well as state-sponsored terror by US and US-led NATO on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

The damage done by centuries of British and Dutch colonialism can only be overturned by SL civil society involving all ethnic and religious groups holding their govt. accountable, to be more responsive to their needs, not letting govt. divide them by language and ethnicity, for political gain.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthiicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
--------------------
NYTimes copyright
April 20, 2009, 6:36 pm
Endgame in Sri Lanka?
By Robert Mackey
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/20/endgame-in-sri-lanka/
-----------
April 21, 2009, 1:23 pm
Two Sri Lankas Struggle to Tell Their Tales
By Robert Mackey
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/two-sri-lankas-struggle-to-tell-their-tales/

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Democracy and Torture

April 20th, 2009 8:40 am
Is torture compatible with Democracy? Apparently it is, in several democratic systems, US, India, South Africa for example, whenever perceived law and order issues and perceived national interest issues are at stake.

The operative word is "perceived."

Torture is incompatible with ETHICAL conceptions of DEMOCRACY. It violates the human body and spirit.

And it is approved and deployed by those in Power, whether they are state-sponsored as in the CIA or extra-state actors like the Taliban.

The expose of waterboarding as a torture technique teaches us that Democracy is always as much a destination as it is a journey.

Democracy's craft is a work in progress, democracy's work is never done. Only We the People can disarm govts. and overturn torture.

----------------
April 20th, 2009 8:55 am Comment #592
TORTURE & THE MEDIA
Why are these revelations about waterboarding coming so late in the deadly game that the US govt has played in Iraq?
Where was the US media? Embedded as well as bamboozled?
Wasn't "shock and awe" itself a form of mass terror and torture? So why this postmortem approach to waterboarding?

Q.Is the US MEDIA complicit (this is not conspiracy theory, it's about complicity) in this delayed reporting on torture? Where are the investigative journalists on the staff of the NYT or The Washington Post?

Besides, civil society publics, both in the US and elsewhere have always suspected that torture was being used in Iraq and Guantanamo.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/us/politics/21intel.html?_r=1&ref=global-home
Obama Urges C.I.A. Not to Be Discouraged by Memos
President Obama spoke at C.I.A. headquarters as C.I.A. director Leon Panetta looked on.
By PETER BAKER and SCOTT SHANE
Published: April 20, 2009
------------------------------

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Waterboarding Used 266 Times on 2 Suspects
By SCOTT SHANE
Published: April 19, 2009
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/20/world/20detain.html

Embar-GO OBAMA in Latin America and Caribbean?

April 19th, 2009 7:52 pm

Obama is doing the very minimum -- to reverse the serious DAMAGE inflicted for over 60 years, by successive United States Govts., upon world stability and peace, by American:

1) militarist -- from Vietnam to Iraq and then some

2)supremacist/exceptionalist (we-are-the-best-the-greatest blather)

3) punitive (as in the unsuccessful sanctions and embargoes)

4)protectionist (there's nothing better than 'free' unfair trade)

foreign policy. I don't expect Obama to do any anything more than make the most minimal adjustments to longstanding US neo-imperial policy.

But at least it's a shaky and transient start. Republicans like Graham and Ensign show Latin America how difficult and untrustworthy the US will be in any negotiation towards a fair world order.

The govts. of Latin America and the Caribbean would be wise not to make any premature and hasty concessions to this or any other US govt., until the US demonstrates substantive changes on the above.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
---------------------------------------------
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/20/world/americas/20prexy.html
162.
April 19, 2009 7:18 pm

Link
President Obama should return to Venezuela the terrorist Luis Posada Carriles who blew up a Cubana airliner in 1967 killing all 73 people aboard and whom the United States has been harboring within our borders since he escaped from a Venezuelan prison while he was awaiting trial in 1985.

President Obama should also apologize for the toppling of dozens of democratically elected governments by the United States in Latin America since 1953 and replacing them with murdering, torturing dictators.

President Obama should also close the School of the Americas (now called the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation), in Fort Benning, Georgia, where the United States trained those dictators' murderers and torturers.

— Bill Appledorf, San Francisco
RecommendedRecommended by 4 Readers
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86.
April 19, 2009 8:07 pm

Link
As a Venezuelan-American from and old and honorable Venezuelan family, I am shocked at the overture that President Obama gave to President Chavez.
I will resume like this: I just visited with my family in Caracas and was horrified about the mess that has become that beautiful city.
In case President Obama, who deserve my respect and admiration, doesn't know about Mr. Chavez, I am going to resume his behavior in one phrase:
Mr Chavez Chavez has caused the most unbelievable destruction and division that now exists in my country of origin. All the three powers, Supreme Court, Legislative and Excecutive are in his hands, managed by his close incompetent friends.
Tha last thing I saw before leaving was the assault of a Sinagogue in which a group of "bandoleros" even destroyed the Torah. This was the result of a very agressive rethoric which he uses against his "enemies."
For no reason he broke diplomatic relations with Israel, a country with which we have had excellent relations. There has never been anti-semitism in Venezuela until he came to power.
I expect President Obama to learn more about Mr. Chavez.

— leomill11, Tucson, Arizona 95718
RecommendedRecommended by 5 Readers
187.
April 19, 2009 8:07 pm

Link
As a truly democrat venezuelan, who opposes Chàvez and his dictatorship and totalitarian government I liked Obamas approach to Chávez. I thought that the multicultural reference that accounts for Obama made him understand what even many venezuelans have not understood. Chávez claims to be the world liberator of all oppressive regimes of the past. He wants to be the leader of the world. As oil prices have diminished he is not so sure on his feet.So he is bright enough and knows that he and needs to enlargen his scope of relations. One of them is US with multicultural President that happens to be brighter than him. I think Obama behaved politically correct and he has to wait for Chávez reactions in order to ask him his pre conditions to negotiatea after he humilated the US Embassador in Caracas and kick him out in 24 hours. As a truly democrat citizen who adverses Chávez I hope that Obama asks Chávez the minimal pre requirements of Democracies. Cha´vez`s totalitarian regime has strenghten trough the last months and days and we citizens of this country have almost no right to talk.....or propieties are in danger

— elisae, Venezuela
Recommend Recommended by 4 Readers
-------------------------------
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/20/world/americas/20prexy.html?hp
Obama Defends Reaching Out to Chávez
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
Published: April 19, 2009
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Civilians, Sovereign States and Extra-State Terror Actors: The Humanitarian Crisis in Sri Lanka

My comment #148. published April 17, 2009 1:40 pm Link
Civilians, Sovereign States and Extra-State Terror Actors
The civilian numbers involved here in Northern Sri Lanka eclipse Srebenica

Innocent women, children and men are presently caught in what appears to be a decisive phase in a murderous 60 year inter-ethno-nationalist conflict that has its origins in the colonial period of British and Dutch exploitation.

All of the “independent” ( including the Times Reporter and HRW) news reports appear to be saying the same thing — that the LTTE terrorists are holding TAMIL civilians as hostages and deploying them as human shields.

Let us understand that the LTTE terror acts have accumulated over decades, not just days. The Govt. of Sri Lanka has deployed its army to quell the rebel action. This is a war situation. Sovereign nation-states have the legal right to maintain law and order within their borders. The govt. and its army have the obligation to end the occupation of Jaffna by LTTE rebels, and end the LTTE claim of a separate ethnic Tamil ‘homeland’

Without a doubt, the Sri Lankan army and the Sri Lankan govt. must be held accountable for any alleged ethnic cleansing of Tamils, whether in Jaffna or elsewhere in the island nation-state. But it appears, once again, that it is the LTTE, not the Sri Lankan Government forces that stop at nothing to recruit Tamil child soldiers, use Tamil women as human shields, forcibly train Tamil civilians to carry out assassinations, coerce Tamil refugees abroad to send funds to pay for LTTE rebel terror separatist action.

So, explain to me, the Sri Lankan Govt. has to accept foreign ships delivering “humanitarian’ supplies? Where will these vital supplies end up? The strong possibility is they will will fall into LTTE terrorists’ hands, because the LTTE cadres need the supplies to continue the rebel action and because the LTTE still control the narrow wedge of land where reportedly hundreds of thousands of innocent Tamils are trapped — by the LTTE!.

Clearly, crimes can be committed under the guise of "humanitarian" relief.

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
------------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/17/is-the-world-ignoring-sri-lankas-srebrenica/?scp=2&sq=Sri%20Lanka%20massacre&st=cse
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India Elections 2009 -- Strengthening Democracy Through Lived Practice

My NYTimes Comment #18 published
April 16, 2009 2:23 pm

A Mega Election

There is poverty, hunger, homelessness, disease, the poor can't eat their vote so what is it good for, our Indian democracy has often been tested and found wanting, India still has a long long way to go to satisfy the most basic necessities of her millions.....

Yet , what an election! There are hundreds of candidates and scores of local and regional parties. Everyone seems to be voting! It's creative chaos under the rule of law. Conducted in 5 phases and lasting a month long with 700 million plus voters eligible to exercise their franchise. There's nothing like it, anywhere.

India's Lok Sabha elections are an unprecedented exercise in Democracy.

In 1947, after an historic freedom struggle led by the iconic Gandhi and a host of compassionate leaders like Maulana Azad,(whom Gandhi called his "conscience keeper") India chose to have a nation-state that was NOT based upon religious identity, but on universal principles of individual rights and responsibilities, yet to be realized in full.

That dream of a democratic secular India, building upon an ancient history and a vibrant, composite culture, has frequently failed to meet the most important needs of its civil society.

But despite our many flaws, our many and continuing inequalities, we have persevered and persisted to become a sovereign nation-state that endures, improve the lives of its diverse peoples and strive to become of force for good in the world.

Satyameva Jayate, Inquilab Zindabad and Jai Ho!

Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
----------------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
Local Issues Dominate as India VotesBack to Article »
By SOMINI SENGUPTA

Neither of the major parties is likely to prevail in the five-week election without the help of smaller parties.
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/17/world/asia/17india.html
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