Politics

U.S. Political Counselor John Brady Kiesling, stationed in Athens, Greece, has resigned his position, outlining his reasons for doing so in a letter to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell.

Service as a U.S. diplomat was a dream job. I was paid to understand foreign languages and cultures, to seek out diplomats, politicians, scholars and journalists, and to persuade them that U.S. interests and theirs fundamentally coincided. My faith in my country and its values was the most powerful weapon in my diplomatic arsenal.

…until this Administration it had been possible to believe that by upholding the policies of my president I was also upholding the interests of the American people and the world. I believe it no longer.

The policies we are now asked to advance are incompatible not only with American values but also with American interests. Our fervent pursuit of war with Iraq is driving us to squander the international legitimacy that has been America’s most potent weapon of both offense and defense since the days of Woodrow Wilson. We have begun to dismantle the largest and most effective web of international relationships the world has ever known. Our current course will bring instability and danger, not security.

Mr. Secretary, I have enormous respect for your character and ability. You have preserved more international credibility for us than our policy deserves, and salvaged something positive from the excesses of an ideological and self-serving Administration. But your loyalty to the President goes too far. We are straining beyond its limits an international system we built with such toil and treasure, a web of laws, treaties, organizations, and shared values that sets limits on our foes far more effectively than it ever constrained America’s ability to defend its interests.

I am resigning because I have tried and failed to reconcile my conscience with my ability to represent the current U.S. Administration. I have confidence that our democratic process is ultimately self-correcting, and hope that in a small way I can contribute from outside to shaping policies that better serve the security and prosperity of the American people and the world we share.

On the one hand, it’s heartening to know that there are politicians like this out there. On the other hand, it’s a shame that they feel forced to resign because of the current administrations policies and goals.

(Via MeFi)

Back in June, when the Pledge of Allegiance was ruled unconstitutional because the words “under God” encroached on the division between church and state, I didn’t think that the ruling would stand. In a nation where if you don’t support the President’s holy crusade you’re just another one of those damn dirty traitors, I expected the public outcry would end up pushing the courts into overturning the ruling.

I was quite pleasantly surprised to read yesterday that the appeals court has rejected the request to reconsider the ruling, letting it stand as-is.

From the New York Times:

A federal appeals court stood by its ruling that reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools is unconstitutional because of the words “under God,” perhaps setting the stage for a U.S. Supreme Court fight over a decision that prompted a nationwide outcry.

Bush administration officials strongly condemned Friday’s ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, though they stopped short of saying they would appeal to the Supreme Court.

[Judge Steven] Reinhardt lashed out at the “disturbingly wrong-headed” dissent that public outcry over the pledge ruling should have persuaded the circuit to reconsider.

“The Bill of Rights is, of course, intended to protect the rights of those in the minority against the temporary passions of a majority which might wish to limit their freedoms or liberties,” Reinhardt wrote.

And from Reuters:

In defending the ruling, defiant 9th Circuit Judge Stephen Reinhardt said that the court would not be swayed by public outrage over one of its decisions and did not consider the “importance of an issue” good enough reason to rehear a legal ruling that it considered correct.

“We may not — we must not — allow public sentiment or outcry to guide our decisions,” Reinhardt wrote.

“It is particularly important that we understand the nature of our obligations and the strength of our constitutional principles in times of national crisis,” he wrote. “It is then that our freedoms and our liberties are in the greatest peril.”

Not terribly surprisingly, Attorney General John Ashcroft has sworn to appeal to the Supreme Court.

“THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT will spare no effort to preserve the rights of all our citizens to pledge allegiance to the American flag,” Ashcroft said in a statement issued in Washington shortly after the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco declined to reconsider its ruling. “We will defend the ability of Americans to declare their patriotism through the time-honored tradition of voluntarily reciting the pledge.”

John, John, John. I’m no legal expert, but I haven’t gotten the impression that the Pledge of Allegiance has been banned outright — only that it is not to be a school-sponsored activity. All Americans still have the right and the ability to voluntarily declare their patriotism any way they want to whenever they want. They just shouldn’t be forced to do so in ways that may conflict with their personal beliefs. I have to admit, the mental picture of a man like Ashcroft — who’s likely to equate Wiccanism with ‘Satanism’ — trying to cope with the concept of a “patriotic Witch” makes me laugh. A lot.Atheists and Agnostics can be patriotic, as can Muslims, Hindus, Baha’i, Buddhists, and so on. Heck, I’d bet that even Jehovah’s Witnesses and Wiccans can be patrotic! But they don’t believe in ‘God’, and shouldn’t be required to profess a belief that they do not hold.

Anyway, the original ruling was made. That ruling has now been confirmed. Now it appears that it may fall to the Supreme Court to finish this off. We’ll see how things end up if this does end up heading their way, but in the meantime, congratulations to Judge Reinheart and the rest of the Court of Appeals.

(Via MeFi and BoingBoing)

Yeah, well, I had to jump back into this side of things eventually. On the bright side, much as this stuff might worry and/or scare me, at least I’m paying attention to it now, which I wasn’t for far too many years.

• With the possible exception of Bill Gates, Dick Cheney is the smartest man I’ve ever met. If you get into a dispute with him, he will take you on a devastatingly brief tour all the weak points in your argument. But he is a careful listener and not at all the ideologue he appears at this distance.
  >

  Here is the problem I think Dick Cheney is trying to address at the moment: How does one assure global stability in a world where there is only one strong power? This is a question that his opposition, myself included, has not asked out loud. It’s not an easy question to answer, but neither is it a question to ignore.

  …it’s possible Cheney and company are actually bluffing.This time, instead of trying to terrify the Soviets into collapse, the objective is even grander. If I’m right about this, they have two goals. Neither involves actual war, any more than the MX missile did.

  First, they seek to scare Saddam Hussein into voluntarily turning his country over to the U.S. and choosing safe exile or, failing that, they want to convince the Iraqi people that it’s safer to attempt his overthrow or assassination than to endure an invasion by American ground troops.

  Second, they are trying to convince every other nation on the planet that the United States is the Mother of All Rogue States, run by mad thugs in possession of 15,000 nuclear warheads they are willing to use and spending, as they already are, more on death-making capacity than all the other countries on the planet combined. In other words, they want the rest of the world to think that we are the ultimate weaving driver. Not to be trusted, but certainly not to be messed with either.

  By these terrible means, they will create a world where war conducted by any country but the United States will seem simply too risky and the Great American Peace will begin. Unregulated Global Corporatism will be the only permissible ideology, every human will have access to McDonald’s and the Home Shopping Network, all ‘news’ will come through some variant of AOLTimeWarnerCNN, the Internet will be run by Microsoft, and so it will remain for a long time. Peace. On Prozac.

  John Perry Barlowe, Sympathy for the Devil, via Phil Ulrich

• This nation is about to embark upon the first test of a revolutionary doctrine applied in an extraordinary way at an unfortunate time. The doctrine of preemption — the idea that the United States or any other nation can legitimately attack a nation that is not imminently threatening but may be threatening in the future — is a radical new twist on the traditional idea of self defense. It appears to be in contravention of international law and the UN Charter. And it is being tested at a time of world-wide terrorism, making many countries around the globe wonder if they will soon be on our — or some other nation’s — hit list. High level Administration figures recently refused to take nuclear weapons off of the table when discussing a possible attack against Iraq. What could be more destabilizing and unwise than this type of uncertainty, particularly in a world where globalism has tied the vital economic and security interests of many nations so closely together? There are huge cracks emerging in our time-honored alliances, and U.S. intentions are suddenly subject to damaging worldwide speculation. Anti-Americanism based on mistrust, misinformation, suspicion, and alarming rhetoric from U.S. leaders is fracturing the once solid alliance against global terrorism which existed after September 11.
  >

  One can understand the anger and shock of any President after the savage attacks of September 11. One can appreciate the frustration of having only a shadow to chase and an amorphous, fleeting enemy on which it is nearly impossible to exact retribution.

  But to turn one’s frustration and anger into the kind of extremely destabilizing and dangerous foreign policy debacle that the world is currently witnessing is inexcusable from any Administration charged with the awesome power and responsibility of guiding the destiny of the greatest superpower on the planet. Frankly many of the pronouncements made by this Administration are outrageous. There is no other word.

  Yet this chamber is hauntingly silent. On what is possibly the eve of horrific infliction of death and destruction on the population of the nation of Iraq — a population, I might add, of which over 50% is under age 15 — this chamber is silent. On what is possibly only days before we send thousands of our own citizens to face unimagined horrors of chemical and biological warfare — this chamber is silent. On the eve of what could possibly be a vicious terrorist attack in retaliation for our attack on Iraq, it is business as usual in the United States Senate.

  We are truly “sleepwalking through history.” In my heart of hearts I pray that this great nation and its good and trusting citizens are not in for a rudest of awakenings.

  Sen. Robert C. Byrd, We stand passively mute, via Allan Moult

• And lastly for tonight, Dori Smith posts a number of articles worth reading, including the two I just quoted from.

I still find it amazing and more than a little concerning that the best commentary regarding the current and upcoming conflict comes primarily from columnists, webloggers, and “ordinary people” across the nation, and all-too-rarely from those on Capitol Hill (with speeches like Senator Byrd’s being a welcome exception). I’ve certainly not seen anything come out of the White House that’s nearly as well thought-out or well presented as many of the less “official” arguments are (both pro- and anti-war).

More good news as I catch up on my newsreading — the Total Information Awareness program is facing heavy opposition, and is likely to be barred from collecting information on American citizens.

House and Senate negotiators have agreed that a Pentagon project intended to detect terrorists by monitoring Internet e-mail and commercial databases for health, financial and travel information cannot be used against Americans.

The conferees also agreed to restrict further research on the program without extensive consultation with Congress.

House leaders agreed with Senate fears about the threat to personal privacy in the Pentagon program, known as Total Information Awareness. So they accepted a Senate provision in the omnibus spending bill passed last month, said Representative Jerry Lewis, the California Republican who heads the defense appropriations subcommittee.

Representative John P. Murtha of Pennsylvania, the senior Democrat on the subcommittee, said of the program, “Jerry’s against it, and I’m against it, so we kept the Senate amendment.” Of the Pentagon, he said, “They’ve got some crazy people over there.”

One important factor in the breadth of the opposition is the fact that the research project is headed by Adm. John M. Poindexter. Several members of Congress have said that the admiral was an unwelcome symbol because he had been convicted of lying to Congress about weapons sales to Iran and illegal aid to Nicaraguan rebels, an issue with constitutional ramifications, the Iran-contra affair. The fact that his conviction was later reversed on the ground that he had been given immunity for the testimony in which he lied did not mitigate Congressional opinion, they said.

Excellent, excellent news. It finally looks like the “anything to catch a terrorist” fervor that has been running rampant is starting to ebb, and more and more people in positions where they can do something are starting to take a second look at what’s going on. I just hope this trend continues.

(Via /. and Tom Tomorrow)

Finally, some good movement happening on the polictical front — a very welcome change from last week’s ranting and raving. It seems that the recently-leaked ‘Patriot II’ draft, in addition to getting attention in the blogging world, is also raising eyebrows on Capitol Hill.

Unlike its hastily passed predecessor, the Justice Department’s wide-ranging follow-up to the Patriot Act of 2001 is already facing intense scrutiny, just days after a civil rights group posted a leaked version of the legislation on its website.

The legislation, nicknamed Patriot II, would broadly expand the government’s surveillance and detention powers. Among other measures, it calls for the creation of a terrorist DNA database and allows the attorney general to revoke citizenship of those who provide “material support” to terrorist groups.

Despite assurances to lawmakers that no bill was in the works, the Justice Department internally circulated a confidential 120-page summary and text of the Domestic Security and Enhancement Act in early January.

Given the intense attention already focused on this bill, some doubt it will be introduced soon.

“This is a very audacious bill designed to strike while the iron is still hot, but I wonder if it is still hot,” said Chris Hoofnagle, deputy counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center . “There is already resistance to new government surveillance powers .”

“This is something you have on the shelf,” said Hoofnagle. “You wait for an opportune moment, like going to war, to introduce it. They call this a draft, but this bill is definitely close to final and gives a good road map of what the Justice Department wants.”

Could it be time to start thinking about impeaching Bush? Realistically, we’re probably not at a point where it’s going to happen, but that hasn’t stopped some people from considering the idea — including Johnson Administration US Attorney General Ramsey Clark. Mr. Clark has drafted articles of impeachment, outlining the crimes and misdemeanors that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Ashcroft should answer for, and the Vote to Impeach website is collecting ‘signatures’ to move the process forward.

The U.S. Constitution provides the means for preventing George W. Bush from engaging in a war of aggression against Iraq, and from advancing a first strike potentially nuclear preemptive war. It’s called impeachment.

Impeachment is the direct constitutional means for removing a President, Vice President or other civil officers of the United States who has acted or threatened acts that are serious offenses against the Constitution, its system of government, or the rule of law, or that are conventional crimes of such a serious nature that they would injure the Presidency if there was no removal.

Impeachment appears six times in the U.S. Constitution. The Founders weren’t concerned with anything more than with impeachment because they had lived under King George III and had in 1776 accused the king of all the things that George W. Bush wants to do: Usurpation of the power of the people; Being above the law; Criminal abuse of authority.

(Via Stavros)

North Korea is entitled to launch a pre-emptive strike against the US rather than wait until the American military have finished with Iraq, the North’s foreign ministry told the Guardian yesterday.

“The United States says that after Iraq, we are next”, said the deputy director Ri Pyong-gap, “but we have our own countermeasures. Pre-emptive attacks are not the exclusive right of the US.”

I have got to find some more cheerful news to post soon, this is getting ridiculous.

I just stumbled across a very well written rebuttal to Powell’s UN address in the Pakistan Daily Times: World Views: Rebutting Powell:

If one believes everything Colin Powell said to the Security Council on February 5^th^, one’s first response ought to be that there’s no reason to fight a war, since US surveillance capabilities are so awesome that Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) can easily be found. And one’s first question should be why has the United States for over two months withheld this apparently so damaging evidence from those weapons inspectors, who could have verified conjectures and destroyed WMD stocks and production facilities.

If indeed the evidence presented is of the character claimed by Powell, then the United States has chosen to sabotage UN Security Council Resolution 1441, clause 10 of which “Requests all Member States to give full support to UNMOVIC and the IAEA in the discharge of their mandates, including by providing any information related to prohibited programmes.”

[…]

It is becoming increasingly likely that the United States will obtain a Security Council resolution authorizing war. And if it does, its main argument will be that it must go to war with Iraq to uphold international law. It’s important to understand ahead of time just how obscene that argument is. It’s not just because the United States has systematically undermined international law with regard to Iraq, by refusing to acknowledge the basis (disarmament) for lifting the sanctions, by committing repeated acts of illegal aggression against Iraq (like the Desert Fox bombing), and by deliberately making the sanctions bite Iraqi society as hard as possible for purely political reasons (see “Economic sanctions as a weapon of mass destruction,” Joy Gordon, Harper’s, November 2002). It’s not just because the United States enforces a double standard, in which itself and favoured allies are exempt from legal requirements while states it decided to target are not.

It’s because this war is a violation of the ultimate international law. It is a “crime against peace,” a war of aggression. It was decided on long ago in the White House, and the only reason other countries may vote in support of it is the repeated statements that the war will happen whether they want it or not. It is the United States holding not just Iraq but the entire world hostage.