Good News in Threes

Dear Friends,

There were three items that really caught my eye in The New York Times today.

First and foremost, it seems that I have once again beaten The New York Times to the punch.  Today's lead editorial was entitled "The F.C.C. and the Internet" which argues persuasively that the F.C.C. needs to be a strong regulator of the internet and that notwithstanding the recent court decision has the power to do so.  It just needs the will to do so and confront the Republican blow back. (here)  The New York Times editorial board probably got this idea from my post of April 11 (here).

Second, I constantly marvel at the fact that it may be possible that President Obama has an overarching master plan for addressing all the issues and that if we are just patient, we will see it.  I am afraid that I am too much of an cynic to believe that but there is evidence nonetheless.  In The New York Times today there was an article entitled "Reaching Out Quietly to Muslims in America" by Andrea Elliott (here)  President Obama is not doing anything that I would not expect him to do, it is just that I did not know that he was doing these things.  What is the saying about a long journey starting with the first step.  It is possible that there is a master plan.  We all need to applaud the President when he takes these steps while keeping pressure on him to make them.

Third, The New York Times had another article entitled " Democrats Seize on Oversight" by Jackie Calmes (here).  The online version of the article differs slightly from the print version.  Here are the paragraphs from the print version that made my day:

In a sign of the Democrats' increasing confidence that they have the better of the argument in an election year defined by voter anger at big banks and bailouts, White House officials said Sunday that President Obama would take his campaign for a regulatory overhaul on the road in coming weeks.
The campaign will resemble his push that helped the health care bill past it final legislative hurdles. 
Mr. Obama in effect has made the measure's fate a highly personal showdown with Senate Republican leader, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.  Over the last 15 months, Mr. McConnell has sought to defeat each of the Democratic president's domestic priorities in turn.

I hope this approach to financial reform indicates that President Obama has recognized that he will need to go to the American people to argue his case so that the American people will pressure Congress to pass President Obama's proposal.  He has both the skills to convince the people and the right policies so that they should be convinced.  It is about time he recognized that this approach will be far more successful than trying to achieve bipartisan support by talking with members of Congress.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal

PS  Here is a wonderful plant.

Important Lessons from Katrina

Dear Friends,

I just finished reading a book entitled Zeitoun by Dave Eggers. (I apologize. I do not know how to underline so I italicized the title instead.)  It tells the story of struggles faced by one New Orleans family just prior to, during and after Katrina struck New Orleans.  Mr. Eggers writes with a nice story telling style that at the beginning of the book masks the terrible truths about America that are revealed towards the end of the story.  The family struggles to prepare for the storm, has to decide to stay or leave, endure the separation caused by the wife/mother leaving with the kids while the husband/father stays to do what he can and the uncertainty and anguish caused by a lack of communication.

But the important part of the story and the important lessons that we need to learn from Katrina comes from the fact that the husband/father (referred to most often by his last name "Zeitoun") is an immigrant from Syria and a Muslim and the wife/mother ("Kathy") is a white Christian American born woman who prior to meeting Zeitoun converted to Islam.

Kathy faces a very difficult relationship with her family who have a hard time accepting her conversion to Islam.  Kathy prior to her exploration of conversion had many misunderstandings and misconceptions about Islam.  Kathy studies and finds many similarities with her Christian upbringing but prefers Islam because it lacks many of the problems she had with the evangelical Christianity she was raised in.  The important lesson from this part of the book is clear.  A lack of knowledge and understanding can lead to irrational fear and even rejection of those you love. 

A very similar lesson is learned from the issues that Zeitoun faces in the aftermath of Katrina where he is arrested in a building he owns by police and military personnel who are heavily armed and scared.  He is really being arrested because the "authorities" believe that he could be Taliban or al-Qaeda for no other reason than he looks and speaks different.  Zeitoun is mistreated physically and emotionally, and he is denied all rights to which he is entitled under our Constitution. 

There is no law.  There is no justice system.  Fear is the major driving force.  Man's inhumanity to man is clear everywhere particularly as it relates to those who are not white.  By now, we should be prepared that after any national trauma, people are afraid and it brings out our bases instincts.  We need to keep in mind the suspension of habeas corpus by President Lincoln during the Civil War, the internment of the Japanese after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the treatment of people of middle eastern descent after 9/11, etc.  It is in times of national trauma and great fear that we need our Constitution more than ever.  Unfortunately, it is in times like those that we are most apt to ignore our Constitution.

The President of the United States along with many other Federal officials including military officers in their oaths of office pledge to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic.  Nowhere in their oaths do they pledge to keep the American people safe by ignoring the Constitution but that is what happens.  You hear politicians of all stripes saying that their job is to keep the American people safe.  Apparently, they were not listening to themselves when they took their oaths of office.  It is the Constitution that comes first.

How can we learn from Katrina and all the national traumas that have led us to ignore the Constitution?  We need to investigate all the claims of breaches of Constitutional rights, we need to hold those that were in power accountable for their actions (including the breach of their oaths of office), and we need to teach the real history of the United States.  America is a great country, and I love it.  But it is not perfect and if we don't remember and teach those parts of our history where we have failed to meet our best intentions then we will repeat our mistakes over and over again.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal

President Obama continues President Bush's Stonewalling

Dear Friends,

First, in honor of A Little Leeway, I am including a picture of a beautiful cactus from Arizona:

A couple of days ago The New York Times ran an editorial entitled "Spying, Civil Liberties and the Courts" (here) that reminded me that President Obama is continuing to use Bush Administration reasons to try to stop people from challenging the Constitutionality of the laws that tried to authorize spying and other invasions of our Constitutional rights in the wake of 9/11 and the continuation of the fear mongering of the Republican Party and the wimpy Democrats.  The Bush Administration used two legal theories to stop any challenges that have nothing to do with the substance of the complaints. 

The first is "standing".  Under our system of jurisprudence, a party must have standing to bring a law suit.  The party must have been injured or have a real claim.  The lack of standing has historically been used to stop claims of environmental damages and other important social justice issues.  The Bush Administration used the theory that unless you could prove you had been illegally spied on, you did not have standing to bring an action to challenge the Constitutionality of the laws that attempted to authorize spying. 

The second is the state secrets doctrine.  Under this doctrine, the Bush Administration would claim that whatever the challenging party wanted was a state secret the disclosure of which would jeopardize our national security so the law suit had to be dismissed.  Of course, it would use the state secrets doctrine to block you from finding out if you had been spied on so that then you would not have standing.  Sounds like Alice in Wonderland.

Unfortunately, the Obama Administration has continued to use these two tools to stop any challenges of the many violations of our Constitutional rights.  The New York Times editorial reminds us once again that the Obama Administration is not ending some of the worst policies of the Bush Administration but is in fact continuing them.   Whatever happened to change we can believe in?  In many cases it apparently is make believe.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal