12:50. Hearing takes a break until around 2:00. We'll be back.
12:44. Menendez calls attention to the issues of recognizing the Armenian genocide and the reunification of Cyprus.
12:41. Sen. Menendez wants to make sure we elevate foreign assistance.
12:29. Clinton on the three D's of foreign policy: defense, diplomacy, and development. Not necessarily in that order, though; she's not too happy about Defense Department encroachment on State turf. Looks like she's already well into her future role.
12:28. Emptywheel at FDL is a little bit cynical about these whole confirmation hearing things...
12:25. Ben Cardin, thankfully, mentions the Iraq refugee crisis. Perhaps Matt Dillon got to him.
12:13. Kerry echoes: Law of the Sea treaty will be a priority of the Foreign Relations committee.
12:10. Murkowski mentions "proximity to North Korea." At least she didn't say Kim Jong Il would rear his head into Alaskan airspace...
(by Dayo Olopade. Dayo holds degrees in Literature and African Studies from Yale University, and is the Washington reporter for The Root.)
LAGOS, NIGERIA--As Lagosians returned to work last week after the holidays, the headlines singing on newsstands across Nigeria was, like most things in this country, shocking, yet pedestrian: "FG, AGENCIES, BUDGET $2bn FOR GENERATORS." Federal agencies from finance to foreign affairs, from commerce to local police have budgeted a total of $2 billion for the privilege of constant electricity in this next year of the 21st century. Lest this seem exorbitant, recall that similar budgetary requests have been made for the last several years. It's not just that the dread Nigerian Electrical and Power Authority (NEPA) will continue to "take light" repeatedly and at random in 2009--nor that countless children will again be burned in kerosene lamp accidents, or smothered by monoxide fumes from faulty generators--this reporting plainly reveals the extent to which NEPA's inefficiencies severely retard Nigerian development.
The Washington Times is not exactly known as a paragon of journalistic excellence. But this scare mongering piece about former Environmental Protection Agency administrator and President elect-Obama's choice to be a new climate change czar Carol Browner's alleged "socialist" ties is laughably foolish. Browner was apparently a member of something called the Commission for a Sustainable World Society, which is part of an international organization of left-of-center parties called Socialist International. On the blogs, commentators like Gateway Pundit calls this an "anti-American, anti-West socialist organization." Jammie Wearing Fool calls it a "communist group" and Sister Toldjah uses this as evidence that Browner is to "left of most leftists." What they fail to point out, though, is that Socialist International includes such notable freedom hating anti-western Marxist groups as the British Labor party, the NDP in Canada, and the Israeli Labor party.
The problems, though, do not stop there. They believe a conspiracy is afoot to hide this affiliation because her name was scrubbed from the website of the Commission for a Sustainable World Society. What the conspiricists do not seem to consider is that her name was taken down because she is no longer a member of the commission. Her name was also taken off the list of directors of the Audubon Society and off the website of the Alliance for Climate Protection, presumably because she can no longer affiliate herself with these organizations while serving in the United States government. The answer is that simple.
Now, I don't speak for Carol Browner. We have never met. But I do think she has some solid ideas on how to wean the United States from its addiction to carbon. For example here is Dr. Browner explaining the merits of a cap and trade system for On Day One.
Today is the seventh anniversary of the opening of the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay. Protests in Madrid and London marked the occasion. Meanwhile, President-elect Barack Obama addressed the question of Guantanamo head on in an ABC News interview yesterday. He demurred on the whether or not he'd be able to close the prison camp in his first 100 days, but re-affirmed his commitment to see the place shuttered.
That's a challenge. I think it's going to take some time and our legal teams are working in consultation with our national security apparatus as we speak to help design exactly what we need to do. But I don't want to be ambiguous about this. We are going to close Guantanamo and we are going to make sure that the procedures we set up are ones that abide by our constitution. That is not only the right thing to do but it actually has to be part of our broader national security strategy because we will send a message to the world that we are serious about our values. [emphasis mine]Not everyone is satisfied with this answer. I think it's pretty significant, though, that Obama couches his objection to Guantanamo in terms of American security interests. For the past seven years the administration judged that the benefits of having a place to indefinitely incarcerate alleged terrorists outweighed the potential damage to American interests from sponsoring an entity so antithetical to American values. Obama's answer suggests that he comes at this from the opposite cost-benefit analysis, that America's strength comes from the idea that is America--not its ability to trap foreigners and place them in zones of nebulous legality. That's change I can believe in. Image from flickr. Creative commons license.
Over at The Washington Note last week, an anonymous journalist in Syria presented a chilling depiction of the increasingly strained predicament of Iraqi refugees in the country.
Housing has proved to be a major issue. Few building owners were willing to rent [a man named Ahmed] an apartment outside of the overwhelmingly Iraqi neighborhoods of Sayyida Zeinab and Jeramanah. Many landlords suspected that Ahmed and his family would prove troublesome, stealing from neighbors or engaging in other acts of criminality. He was eventually able to rent a small, unfurnished apartment, but only by concealing his nationality from the apartment's owner. Ahmed and his wife have also confronted the daunting task of finding work, since Iraqis are not legally allowed to hold jobs. They have been turned down from even the most low-paying of jobs, and have been forced to fall back on begging and other handouts. But it's not just the legal issues that are preventing Syrians from hiring them; many employers doubt the couple's trustworthiness and character based on their nationality alone. Ahmed's situation is shared by many Iraqis in Syria, and it suggests that social prejudices and xenophobia, in addition to legal barriers, are proving increasingly problematic for refugees. Some Syrians have begun to use the term "dirty" to describe their Iraqi neighbors. I noticed the term used on multiple occasions, often coupled with descriptions of the refugees as being cheaters, thieves, and prostitutes. Not surprisingly, some Iraqis (though not all) describe feeling unwelcome as well; many lie about their country of origin, explaining away their unusual accent as a product of a village upbringing. It's a falsehood that allows them to get a job or rent an apartment or, at the very least, escape various degrees of social ostracization.This dynamic, of course, is not simply attributable to racism. With a substantial refugee presence for over five years, coupled with the job-tightening of the global economic downturn, the situation of many Syrians is unenviable. But so too is that of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees, still living in a country not their own, but not yet able to return. Read the whole piece; it is fascinating. And for those of you in DC, tonight Refugees International is hosting a presentation of Betrayed, George Packer's play about the difficult experiences of Iraqis who worked with Americans in the country. (image of an Iraqi refugee in Syria, from flickr user catholicrlf under a Creative Commons license)
When the United States abstained at the last minute on last week's Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, many were surprised, since Washington had made its support for the resolution clear. John Bolton was surprised, too, but in the other direction: if he had been there, the U.S. would have swung the pendulum all the way to a veto.
What's interesting about Bolton's stance is not so much the reasoning behind his unthinking opposition to this particular resolution -- which he declines to provide in his Wall Street Journal op-ed today, instead simply labeling the measure "anti-Israel" as a matter of course -- but the worldview that shapes his convictions. In chastising the United States for not thumping its veto loudly upon the table, Bolton does not seem the least concerned that the resolution passed; what really irks him is what he sees as the United States' "weakness." In his black-and-white conception of Security Council dynamics, there are only two positions: strength and cowardice.
But abstaining comes with its own costs. A permanent member's abstention invariably reflects that it failed to achieve its objectives. It also signals timidity.Included are some ruminations about other countries' foreign policies that London, Paris, Moscow, and Beijing might be surprised to learn.
Britain and France avoid vetoes for fear that if they are seen to be too hard-edged, they will be harried off of the Security Council and replaced by one European Union seat. Russia and China are motivated by other pressures. Russia is cautious because its influence is waning. China's influence is increasing, but it feels the need to tread lightly.Nowhere does Bolton give any indication that countries might vote for a resolution because they support it, or vote against it because they oppose it. Everything is part of a hard-nosed political game, one with no room for compromise (or "surrender," as revealingly Bolton terms it in his book). The idea of abstaining from a vote out of a sense of not wanting to derail an entire peace process, then, finds no room in Bolton's schema. For what is peace in Gaza when there are important objectives like flaunting American power to accomplish? (image from flickr user graney under a Creative Commons license)
In this diavlog, Julia Speigel of the Enough Project talks about a recent military strike against the Lord's Resistance Army, a rebel group from Northern Uganda.
A whole collection of navies from around the globe (even from hitherto pacifist Japan!) have pooled their resources to do battle against those enemies-of-all -- or are they really more like vigilante coastguards? -- the pirates off the coast of Somalia. And guess who is leading the charge.
terrorists criminals of the sea -- pirates have allegedly released the huge Saudi oil tanker that they'd been holding since November, in exchange for a cool (parachuted) $3 million (hopefully in new bills) -- the situation on land in Somalia is getting correspondingly worse. Ethiopian troops supporting the fragile government are heading out, and Islamic insurgents are moving in, taking over police stations in Mogadishu.
The gulf [no pun intended] of international attention between the anarchy threatening shipping lanes and that threatening the lives of Somali civilians is not just morally disheartening. It also unfortunately underscores the ultimate need to focus more serious efforts at rebuilding Somali society on land as the only way to address the roots of the crisis on the seas. I am reassured that the world community can come together so quickly and effectively to fight the scourge of piracy, but there are many other -- and typically less "sexy" -- scourges out there equally in need of fighting...just not always with battle cruisers.
(image of a portrait of Admiral Chester Nimitz -- not, as far as I know, a pirate hunter -- from flickr user cliff1066 under a Creative Commons license)
A new international force to combat piracy off the coast of Somalia is being formed and will be headed by an American admiral, the US navy says. More than 20 nations are expected to contribute to the force, due to be fully operational later in January.If the mightiest navies of the world can't take down these machine gun-toting, speedboat-crusing marauders, then Abdirahman Mohamud Farole, the newly elected president of Puntland, Somalia's semiautonomous government and apparently underestimated maritime power, says he's got it covered.
"I will eliminate the piracy... and will deal with the security," he said.Except that...the recently resigned president of Somalia's nominally "national" government was also from Puntland, and he didn't have much success in either clamping down on pirates or controlling the anarchic violence in his own country. And as the tide seems to turn against the
Special notice for readers in the Washington, DC area .
On January 9, prepare for an all-out musical assault at the National Press Club. Four of D.C.'s best bands -- composed of journalists from the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, McClatchy Newspapers, the Washington Independent, Bloomberg News, among others -- will try to claim for themselves the title of Best Reporter-Based Washington Rock Group. Who will prevail? The bluesy thump of Nobody's Business? The New Pornographers-esque power pop of Anchorage? The eclectic sounds of Suspicious Package? The spare, dark indie rock of The Surge? Only the first annual JOURNOPALOOZA will determine who wears the crown. And just as the best journalism is that which serves the public good, JOURNOPALOOZA is a rock festival with a charitable mission. All proceeds will benefit two very worthy causes. The Committee to Protect Journalists is an advocacy organization that aids our colleagues in their efforts to bring out the truth under the harshest of conditions. Half of the money raised with Journopalooza will go to CPJ's Journalist Assistance Fund, their emergency resource to save journalists who must go into hiding or exile to escape threats; journalists in need of medicine and other material support in prison; and journalists injured after violent attacks. The other half of the proceeds will help fund the National Press Club's efforts to hone the skills of the next generation of newsgatherers with their array of training programs and scholarships.Check it out. These are important causes.