The President of Paradox
By Laura Flanders
TheNation.blog: May 28,, 2009
It will be an historic occasion when Sonia Sotomayor takes her seat.
Assuming she's confirmed, she'll be the first woman of color and the first
person from the Latino community to become a Supreme Court justice.
Announcing this, his first top court appointment, President Obama put it
clearly enough: "When Sonia Sotomayor ascends those marble steps to assume
her seat on the highest court of the land, America will have taken another
important step towards realizing the ideal that is etched above its
entrance: Equal Justice under the law."
It's pretty simple and kind of stirring stuff. There aren't royals and
non-royals, just human beings. And those two words: Equal and Justice.
Equal. Equality is indivisible. It either is or it isn't. We learned that,
from among others, Dr Martin Luther King, Jr.
Justice. Those blind, balancing scales -- they either balance or they're
tilted. It's not rocket science.
It's hard not to be moved by Judge Sotomayor's story: from Puerto Rican
parents in the Bronx to the highest court in the land. Just as the
swearing-in of the first African American president inspired millions of
Americans from all walks of life -- to wake up early and stand on a very
frigid National Mall to watch his inauguration. So, people of all sorts feel
good about the nomination of Sotomayor. As Obama said, it feels as if the
nation's making progress.
But what a paradoxical day. At the very same time that one court was moving
(possibly) towards an ideal; in another they were stepping back from it.
While the President was lifting up the nation's professed ideals in
Washington, in California, justices approved discrimination against same
sex -couples under the law, with only one dissent from the lone Democrat.
There aren't a lot of ways of going at this.
Separate isn't equal.
Justice is balanced or tilted.
If Barack Obama doesn't want to be remembered as the President of paradox,
it's time he stood up and provided leadership. If you believe in those words
etched above the Supreme Court entrance, Mr. President, stand up for all
Americans to ascend those marble steps -- to marriage, to the court - Those
words again are Equal Justice.
Laura Flanders is the host of GRITtv which broadcasts weekdays on Free
Speech TV (Dish Network Ch. 9415) on cable (8 pm ET on Channel 67 in
Manhattan and other cities) and online daily at GRITtv.org and
TheNation.com.
***
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSISL484432
U.S. raid killed 97 civilians - Afghan rights group
By Sayed Salahuddin
Reuters: May 26, 2009
Kabul - A U.S. air strike in western Afghanistan early this month was a
disproportionate use of force that killed 97 civilians and no more than two
Taliban fighters, an Afghan rights watchdog said in a report on Tuesday.
Afghan officials, including President Hamid Karzai, have put the death toll
as high as 140 and say the strikes hit houses in two villages in western
Farah province in which mostly women and children were hiding.
The U.S. military has acknowledged 20-35 civilians were among 80-95 mostly
Taliban fighters killed in the strikes during a May 3 battle in which U.S.
Marines and Afghan security forces were attacked. It said Taliban used the
villagers as human shields.
Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission is the first group not
tied to the U.S. military or Afghan government to present a report into the
incident.
"This was a reaction with extreme use of force to destroy a group of
opponents, and would have been disproportionate even if they were there,"
Nader Nadery, a commissioner for the group, told a news conference in the
Afghan capital.
The group's initial investigation into Farah's bombing showed the 97 dead
included 65 children and 21 women, he said.
Its investigators found no evidence that any of the victims were armed or
that they had been used as human shields, Nadery said, although provincial
officials had told the team that two of the dead were Taliban fighters.
With civilian casualties already a source of great tension, the dispute
between Afghan and U.S. authorities over the number killed in Farah has
stoked popular anger.
Nadery called on the United States to compensate those who lost family
members or their homes in the strikes, and said the deaths would not help
Washington promote security and stability in Afghanistan.
The issue of civilian deaths, particularly from air strikes, has fuelled
resentment towards the almost 80,000 foreign troops in the country fighting
a growing Taliban insurgency.
But Afghanistan's size and difficult terrain means foreign troops must often
rely on air power while hunting militants. (Editing by Emma Graham-Harrison
and Paul Tait)
***
http://www.truthout.org/052809M
Iraq Redux? Obama Seeks Funds for Pakistan Super-Embassy
by Saeed Shah and Warren P. Strobel
McClatchy Newspapers: May 27, 2009
Islamabad - The U.S. is embarking on a $1 billion crash program to expand
its diplomatic presence in Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan, another
sign that the Obama administration is making a costly, long-term commitment
to war-torn South Asia, U.S. officials said Wednesday.
The White House has asked Congress for, and seems likely to receive,
$736 million to build a new U.S. embassy in Islamabad, along with permanent
housing for U.S. government civilians and new office space in the Pakistani
capital.
The scale of the projects rivals the giant U.S. Embassy in Baghdad,
which was completed last year after construction delays at a cost of $740
million.
Senior State Department officials said the expanded diplomatic presence
is needed to replace overcrowded, dilapidated and unsafe facilities and to
support a "surge" of civilian officials into Afghanistan and Pakistan
ordered by President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Other major projects are planned for Kabul, Afghanistan; and for the
Pakistani cities of Lahore and Peshawar. In Peshawar, the U.S. government is
negotiating the purchase of a five-star hotel that would house a new U.S.
consulate.
Funds for the projects are included in a 2009 supplemental spending bill
that the House of Representatives and the Senate have passed in slightly
different forms.
Obama has repeatedly stated that stabilizing Pakistan and Afghanistan,
the countries from which al Qaida and the Taliban operate, is vital to U.S.
national security. He's ordered thousands of additional troops to
Afghanistan and is proposing substantially increased aid to both countries.
In Pakistan, however, large parts of the population are hostile to the
U.S. presence in the region, despite receiving billions of dollars in aid
from Washington since 2001, and anti-American groups and politicians are
likely to seize on the expanded diplomatic presence in Islamabad as evidence
of American "imperial designs."
"This is a replay of Baghdad," said Khurshid Ahmad, a member of
Pakistan's upper house of parliament for Jamaat-e-Islami, one of the
country's two main religious political parties. "This (Islamabad embassy) is
more (space) than they should need. It's for the micro and macro management
of Pakistan, and using Pakistan for pushing the American agenda in Central
Asia."
In Baghdad and other dangerous locales, U.S. diplomats have sometimes
found themselves cut off from the population in heavily fortified compounds
surrounded by blast walls, concertina wire and armed guards.
"If you're going to have people live in a car bomb-prone place, your are
driven to not have a light footprint," said Ronald Neumann, a former U.S.
ambassador to Afghanistan and the president of the American Academy of
Diplomacy. Neumann called the planned expansions "generally pretty
justified."
In Islamabad, according to State Department budget documents, the plan
calls for the rapid construction of a $111 million new office annex to
accommodate 330 workers; $197 million to build 156 permanent and 80
temporary housing units; and a $405 million replacement of the main embassy
building. The existing embassy, in the capital's leafy diplomatic enclave,
was badly damaged in a 1979 assault by Pakistani students.
The U.S. government also plans to revamp its consular buildings in the
eastern city of Lahore and in Peshawar, the regional capital of the
militancy plagued North West Frontier Province. The consulate in the
southern megacity of Karachi has just been relocated into a new
purpose-built accommodation.
A senior State Department official confirmed that the U.S. plan for the
consulate in Peshawar involves the purchase of the luxury Pearl Continental
hotel. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn't
authorized to speak publicly.
The Pearl Contintental is the city's only five-star hotel, set in its
own expansive grounds, with a swimming pool. It's owned by Pakistani tycoon
Sadruddin Hashwani.
Peshawar is an important station for gathering intelligence on the
tribal area that surrounds the city on three sides and is a base for al
Qaida and the Taliban. The area also will be a focus for expanded U.S. aid
programs, and the American mission in Peshawar has already expanded from
three U.S. diplomats to several dozen.
In all, the administration requested $806 million for diplomatic
construction and security in Pakistan.
"For the strong commitment the U.S. is making in the country of
Pakistan, we need the necessary platform to fulfill our diplomatic mission,"
said Jonathan Blyth of the State Department's Overseas Buildings Operations
bureau. "The embassy is in need of upgrading and expansion to meet our
future mission requirements."
A senior Pakistani official said the expansion has been under discussion
for three years. "Pakistanis understand the need for having diplomatic
missions expanding and the Americans always have had an enclave in
Islamabad," said the official, who requested anonymity because he wasn't
authorized to discuss the matter publicly. "Will some people exploit it?
They will."
In Kabul, the U.S. government is negotiating an $87 million purchase of
a 30- to 40-acre parcel of land to expand the embassy. The Senate version of
the appropriations bill omits all but $10 million of those funds.
--------
Shah is a McClatchy special correspondent. Jonathan S. Landay
contributed to this article.
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