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John Bolton gives us more of Mary Robinson’s extreme views.
…In fact, Ms. Robinson wanted U.N. control over NATO’s actions: “It surely must be right for the Security Council . . . to have a say in whether a prolonged bombing campaign in which the bombers choose their target at will is consistent with the principle of legality under the Charter of the United Nations.” One wonders if this is also Mr. Obama’s view, given the enormous consequences for U.S. national security.
This February, asked whether former President George W. Bush should be prosecuted for war crimes, Ms. Robinson answered that it was “premature,” until a “process” such as an “independent inquiry” was established: “[T]hen the decision can be taken as to whether anybody will be held accountable.” In particular, she objected to the Bush administration’s “war paradigm” for dealing with terrorism, saying we actually “need to reinforce the criminal justice system.” Asked about Mr. Obama’s statements on “moving forward,” Ms. Robinson responded that “one of the ways of looking forward is to have the courage to say we must inquire.”
Ms. Robinson’s award shows Mr. Obama’s detachment from longstanding, mainstream, American public opinion on foreign policy. The administration’s tin ear to the furor over Ms. Robinson underlines how deep that detachment really is.
Rick Richman looks at whether Mary Robinson’s radical views were known by the White House.
…It is highly unlikely that the nomination was the result of poor vetting, which involves nominating someone who appears appropriate and then discovering he has a tax problem, for example. But if you know about the tax problem and nominate him anyway—because you think his services are necessary to solve a more important problem—the issue is not one of vetting but of judgment, as well as what you are trying to achieve with the nomination.
Ed Lasky has marshaled a lot of evidence indicating that the person responsible for selecting and/or vetting Robinson was the president’s close friend and White House adviser Samantha Power, who would likely have been familiar with Robinson’s background. Robinson’s record at Durban did not, in any event, need a background check; it was in the foreground of her public record (see Tom Lantos’s lengthy Durban report). It was not a hidden tax problem but a known quality deemed not disqualifying given the larger problem to be solved by the nomination.
What was that problem? In an important 7,345-word post (with a 1,700-word follow-up), Catherine Fitzpatrick—who was at Durban I and watched Robinson’s performance there, and who is both her defender and her critic—says the nomination was “an effort to deflect criticism of the United States coming furiously from some leftist groups for the U.S. decision not to participate in the follow-up conference in Durban in April.” She concludes that “at the end of the day, the Obama Administration chose Mary Robinson because they felt she was one of their own.”…
Rick Richman thinks Obama’s Cairo speech fit a Mary Robinson quote hand-in-glove.
One of the most controversial parts of Barack Obama’s Cairo speech was the portion in which he appeared to draw a moral equivalence between the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust and the Palestinian “dislocation” and “occupation” arising from the wars against the Jewish state in 1948 and 1967.
It is worth revisiting that portion of the Cairo address in connection with the continuing Mary Robinson controversy. Here is what Obama said in Cairo:
Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust. . . .
On the other hand, it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people—Muslims and Christians— have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For more than 60 years they’ve endured the pain of dislocation. . . . They endure the daily humiliations—large and small—that come with occupation.
The “on the one hand/on the other hand” character of Obama’s discussion of the Holocaust caused an adverse reaction among the Israeli public as well as among a significant portion of American Jews and helped create the widespread lack of trust in Obama that now exists in Israel. …
Paul Johnson discusses the possibility of an Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities.
How worried should we be about Iran? Should we encourage the Israelis to make a defensive strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities? Israel has carried out similar strikes twice before–once against Saddam Hussein’s French-built reactor in Iraq and, more recently, against a Syrian nuclear plant. Both were successful.
Knocking out Iran’s nuclear capability would be much more difficult because of the distance to be covered by Israeli aircraft and because the plants are underground. These difficulties must be weighed against the fact that the Iranian regime is unpopular everywhere because of its recent crooked election and the savagery with which protests against the results were put down.
The extent of this unpopularity is evidenced by Saudi Arabia’s recent agreement to allow Israeli aircraft to fly over Saudi territory en route to Iran. The agreement was secret but was widely leaked by the Saudis–a message to Tehran that its stance and putative bomb are unpopular in the Muslim world. In fact, Saudi Arabia, other Gulf States and Iraq–all with which Iran has had longstanding and bitter territorial disputes–are more scared of Iran’s bomb being used against them than are the Israelis. …
John Fund wonders if the next thing to trip up congress will be the grab bag called “per diems”. Remember what Mark Twain said. “There is no native American criminal class …… except for congress.
… The total cost for congressional overseas travel is never made public because the price tag for State Department advance teams and military planes used by lawmakers are folded into much larger budgets. Members of Congress must only report the total per diem reimbursements they receive in cash for hotels, meals and local transport.
They don’t have to itemize expenses—a convenient arrangement since most costs are covered by the government or local hosts. Some trips subtract some hotel and meal costs from the per diems, others do not. “The policy is completely inconsistent,” one House member told me. Total per diem allowances (per person, including staff) can top $3,000 for a single trip. Unused funds are supposed to be given back to the government, but congressional records show that rarely happens. …
The Democrats still play the victims, says David Harsanyi.
They own the bully pulpit. They enjoy a mandate. They can move the votes. They dictate the debate. They write the legislation. They monopolize the coverage.
When it comes to politics, Democrats are U.S. Steel, Ma Bell and Google all rolled into one. And yet, due to a mystifying cosmic event, they are also victims.
In a recent editorial in USA Today, Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and sidekick Steny Hoyer grumbled about how reactionaries were shutting down the voices of the enlightenment on health care. …
…If the government-run health bill doesn’t pass, it won’t be the result of anyone’s voice being quashed. In fact, I would be curious to meet the Herculean life form that has the capability to “drown out” either President Barack Obama or Pelosi. …
Walter Williams asks what benefit Blacks have from their increased political power.
… Blacks hold high offices and dominate the political arena in Philadelphia, Detroit, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., New Orleans and other cities. Yet these are the very cities with the nation’s most rotten schools, highest crime rates, high illegitimacy rates, weak family structure and other forms of social pathology. I am not saying that blacks having political power is the cause of these problems. What I am saying is that the solution to most of the major problems that confront many black people won’t be found in the political arena and by electing more blacks to high office. In fact, politicians tend to be hostile to some of the solutions to problems many blacks face such as school choice as a means to strengthen education, the elimination of oppressive licensing restrictions for various occupations, and supportive of job-destroying labor legislation such as minimum wage laws. …
Jonah Goldberg posts in The Corner on a statement by America’s surgeons.
… We agree with the President that the best thing for patients with diabetes is to manage the disease proactively to avoid the bad consequences that can occur, including blindness, stroke, and amputation. But as is the case for a person who has been treated for cancer and still needs to have a tumor removed, or a person who is in a terrible car crash and needs access to a trauma surgeon, there are times when even a perfectly managed diabetic patient needs a surgeon. The President’s remarks are truly alarming and run the risk of damaging the all-important trust between surgeons and their patients. …
Dick Morris and Eileen McGann have an interesting note on Cash for (American) Clunkers.
The only part of the stimulus program that is working, the cash-for-clunkers program is, in reality, a subsidy to foreign car companies, proving that Barack Obama is the best president Japan ever had.
The Department of Transportation reports that the ten leading trade-ins are all American branded cars while six of the top ten new cars purchased – and four of the top five – are foreign. So the United States Senate is about to pass additional funds to subsidize the trade-in of American cars and the purchase of foreign cars. …
Thomas Sowell shares some wonderful random thoughts with us. Here are three:
…Different people have very different reactions to President Barack Obama. Those who listen to his rhetoric are often inspired, while those who follow what he actually does are often appalled.
New York and Chicago have both recently had their coldest June in generations. If they had had their hottest month, it would have been trumpeted from the media 24/7 by “global warming” zealots. But the average surface temperature of the earth has not changed in more than a decade, according to the Cato Institute.
…What did we learn from the “beer summit” on the White House lawn, except that Vice President Joe Biden doesn’t drink alcoholic beverages? Considering the many gaffes that the vice president has made while cold sober, the thought of an intoxicated Joe Biden boggles the mind. …
How’s this for a start to the humor section. Yale University publishes a book on the Muhammad cartoon controversy. Guess what they wouldn’t put in the book? Allahpundit at Hot Air has the story. Quoting the NY Times;
Yale University and Yale University Press consulted two dozen authorities, including diplomats and experts on Islam and counterterrorism, and the recommendation was unanimous: The book, “The Cartoons That Shook the World,” should not include the 12 Danish drawings that originally appeared in September 2005. What’s more, they suggested that the Yale press also refrain from publishing any other illustrations of the prophet that were to be included, specifically, a drawing for a children’s book; an Ottoman print; and a sketch by the 19th-century artist Gustave Doré of Muhammad being tormented in Hell, an episode from Dante’s “Inferno” that has been depicted by Botticelli, Blake, Rodin and Dalí…
Commenting on the story, Mark Steyn says;
… What all these stories – from this disgusting act to the no-donuts-at-Ramadan “recommendations” now common at European businesses - have in common is acceptance of the same general principle: that the most extreme interpretation of Islamic “law” now applies to Muslim and non-Muslim alike. As Pat Condell says, what other freedoms are you willing to surrender?