Currently viewing the tag: “Rights”
In a rare move, some human rights and anti-genocide groups are writing to Senators urging them to reject President Obama’s nominee to be US Ambassador to Kenya, Air Force General Scott Gration (ret.), accusing him of having done a poor…
Political Punch
On Wednesday I testified before the Alaska House Judiciary Committee about a bill to outlaw the use of foreign law in Alaska courts. Discussion by all witnesses was all about Sharia. Also testifying on behalf of the pro-freedom bill were freedom fighters Pamela Geller, Nonie Darwish and Janet Levy. It is a peculiar feature of our Orwellian age that those testifying on behalf of a law that would protect the freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and equality of rights for all citizens are called “divisive,” while those carrying water for the most repressive legal system on the planet are cast as the liberal, tolerant ones.
“Palmer lawmaker’s bill aimed at Islamic law called divisive,” by Sean Cockerham for the News Tribune, March 31 (thanks to Pamela Geller):
JUNEAU — Palmer Republican Rep. Carl Gatto has set off a political firestorm with a bill aimed at stopping what he deems as the potential of Islamic religious law — Sharia — trumping the U.S. Constitution in Alaska courts.
Gatto said he has strong support of Mat-Su area tea party groups and has received nearly 500 emails and phone calls from places like New Zealand, Poland and Israel in support of his bill. It’s part of a push nationally by conservative state legislators, with similar measures introduced in more than a dozen states.
A Muslim group in Anchorage says Gatto is spreading an anti-Islam message and the Alaska Civil Liberties Union argues the bill could have unintended legal consequences. The Alaska Department of Law, meanwhile, testified it’s hard to see the bill having any real effect as U.S. law already reigns supreme in Alaska’s courts.
Gatto said he grew up in New York City, where his Italian neighborhood clung to technically illegal customs like giving a child whiskey to help with illness. But the world of other immigrants is different, he argued.
“I’m more concerned about cultures that are vastly different from European immigrants, who come here and prefer to maintain their specific laws from their previous countries, which are in violent conflict with American law,” Gatto said. “That’s the issue that I am worried about.”
Gatto’s proposal, House Bill 88, says Alaska courts can’t apply foreign law if it would violate an individual’s rights guaranteed by the Constitutions of the United States or the state of Alaska. Gatto doesn’t have examples of Alaska courts imposing Islamic Sharia law but said his bill is determined to make sure that it doesn’t happen.
A member of the Islamic Community Center of Alaska sent an email addressed to Gatto saying 4,000 to 6,000 Muslims live peacefully in Alaska and asking him to “please do not ignite hate and misunderstanding.” Another Muslim from Anchorage, Lamin Jobarteh, said Muslims follow U.S. law. There is no Sharia law in Alaska, he said.
“There is nothing like that. We have a harmonious relationship with everybody here,” said Jobarteh, who said he’s originally from Gambia and has lived in Anchorage for the past 17 years.
It’s become an issue throughout the nation. Oklahoma voters in November approved a ban against state judges considering Islamic law in making their court decisions. The ban is tied up in court.
The sponsor of the Oklahoma ban pointed to a family court judge in New Jersey citing a man’s Islamic faith in denying a restraining order to a woman who said she had been raped by her husband. The ruling was overturned by a higher court.
A model for the anti-Sharia bills around the country came from an Arizona attorney named David Yerushalmi. The Anti- Defamation League has called him a bigot for past writings such as, in an article commenting on murders of blacks by blacks in New York, said it appeared to be a “relatively murderous race killing itself” and that “Muslim civilization is at war with Judeo-Christian civilization.”
Yerushalmi said in an emailed response this week that his words have been twisted, that he doesn’t countenance racism and that “Sharia is an objective and knowable legal system that is offensive to our constitutional liberties.”
The Council on American-Islamic Relations called on Gatto to drop his invitation for Stop Islamization of America Executive Director Pamela Geller to testify at a Wednesday hearing on his bill, saying she leads a hate group.
Gatto shrugged off the request. “Anybody can make a statement that if they are opposed to your point of view they’re a hate group,” he said.
A New York Times profile of Geller that ran last fall described the growing influence of her website, Atlas Shrugs, and her posting of doctored photos of Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan in a Nazi helmet and suggestion that the State Department was run by “Islamic Supremacists.”
Geller testified Wednesday by telephone to the Alaska House Judiciary Committee, which Gatto chairs.
“How can anyone oppose a law that seeks to prevent foreign laws from undermining fundamental Constitutional liberties?” Geller said.
Geller maintained “surveys in the Muslim world” show most Muslims want a unified caliphate with a “strict al-Qaida-like Sharia.” She spoke of Muslim polygamy, jihad in support of Sharia, and said Muslims have demanded special accommodation in U.S. schools, workplaces and government.
Anchorage Democratic Rep. Lindsey Holmes objected.
“I’m getting very uncomfortable with what I see is some fairly negative testimony against a large segment of society. I think we’re getting off into some pretty dangerous, divisive territory,” Holmes said,
Geller responded that “I don’t think I did anything offensive, I merely stated the facts.”
Activist and former Muslim Nonie Darwish testified in support of the bill, talking about oppression of women in her home country of Egypt. Sam Obeidi, an Anchorage businessman, told the committee that American Muslims respect the U.S Constitution, and that Sharia was being mischaracterized….
Sure, Sam. Go to Riyadh or Tehran and tell them they’re mischaracterizing Sharia.
UN Human Rights Council ends its 16th session with usual self-laudatory praise / “Cultural relativism is nothing but an excuse to violate human rights.” / Appeal to Pope for removal of infamous blood-libel plaque from Damascus Church
Comments by David G. Littman, representative for the World Union for Progressive Judaism at the United Nations in Geneva and statements at the 16 Session of the Council on Human Rights:
This is the final follow-up to my two earlier pieces here and here.
* * * * *
The 16th session of the Human Rights Council ended on March 25 with 5 egregious anti-Israeli Resolutions–all sponsored by Pakistan’s delegate, ironically speaking on behalf of the OIC. Only the USA had the temerity to vote against all, providing sound arguments in each case. Israel’s ambassador Aharon Leshno-Yaar spoke only once in a moving brief statement in regard to the recent terrorist atrocities in Israel, condemning the Council’s bias and comparing it to the infamous Commission. Some EU countries abstained on some resolutions and two voted with the USA against one. To give an idea of some of the ongoing absurdities, Egypt’s ambassador, speaking for the 118 members and 18 observers of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), sponsored the resolution on ‘Enhancement of international cooperation in the field of human rights’ and another resolution on the ‘Right to Development’. Saudi Arabia, Syria, Palestine, Jordan, Cuba (often) provided ludicrous ‘comments’ now and again, and other rogue states too.
* * * * *
I was driven to the Palais des Nations on March 22 by an NGO friend and delivered two key statements, although with a rather hoarse voice. The UN Webcast link allows readers to see – and the verbatim text below gives the text as pronounced (same with our 2nd oral statement).
* * * * *
WORLD UNION FOR PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM
UN Human Rights Council – 16th Session (28 February-25 March)
Statement by David G. Littman 22 March (10:30am)
Follow-up and implementation of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action:
Integrating the human rights of women throughout the United Nations system (item
* * * * *
Violence against women & related taboo subjects at the Human Rights Council & elsewhere
Madam, it is nearly 3 years since an ‘Affair’ [the ‘Sharia-gate Shipwreck’] occurred at the Council on this very item, concerning our joint statement on a follow-up to the DPA regarding ‘violence against women’ (here) (1).
We were immediately stopped on a ‘point of order’ by a Member State delegate [Egypt] who later declared [on a ‘point of order’ – followed by two dozen more and a 40 minute recess] that “Islam will not be crucified at this Council.” (2) We had simply condemned FGM – the barbaric female genital mutilation of up to three million young girls every year in 32 countries, 29 of which are members of the OIC (3); the stoning of women; honour killing and the marriage-sale of 9 year-old-girls – all carried out in the name either of ‘traditional practices’ or ‘cultural relativism’, but with irrefutable religious connections.
We shall again quote from two experts on this crucial phenomenon, which is more and more on the rise. In 2003, Ms Radhika Coomaraswamy, stressing the integrity of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenants, provided an analysis of cultural relativism in her Final Report to the Commission on Violence against Women. She wrote: “The greatest challenge to women’s rights and the elimination of discriminatory laws and harmful practices comes from the doctrine of cultural relativism.” (4)
In 2008, in a 60th anniversary UDHR lecture here in Geneva, Noble Peace Prize Laureate Shirin Ebadi declared: “The idea of cultural relativism is nothing but an excuse to violate human rights.” She also condemned the fact that, in her native country [Iran], a girl is considered an adult and liable to punishment, even execution, at 9 and a boy at 15.
Such crimes, carried out traditionally, but also with official religious backing should not be treated as taboo subjects at the Council, because of fear of religious sensitivities. The growing phenomenon of ‘cultural relativism’ should not be supported by self-censorship at the UN and especially not under the guise of ‘complementary standards’. It is time for more and more States and NGOs to speak out against all the roots of such barbaric practices against women. We appeal to both the Council and the High Commissioner for Human Rights to reconsider this matter and end any complicit silence. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Notes:
1) 8th Session, 16 June 2008. DGL speaking jointly for the AWE & the IHEU. See here.
2) 1st ‘point of order’ by Egyptian delegate Amr Roshdy Hassan after 22 seconds; he made six others and 20 more followed, including a 40 minute and a 2nd 5 minute recess for the president to discuss with the OIC. The President then informed the speaker that the word ‘sharia’ could not be pronounced at the Council.
3) See E/CN.4/Sub.2/2005/NGO/27: Background on “Traditional or Customary Practices” /Female Genital Mutilation and the Arabic text (and translations), certified by Al-Azhar University, authoritative source for Shafi’i school of Sunni law widely adhered to in Egypt.
4) 9th & Final Report: E/CN.4/2003/75, section VII: Religious Extremism & Harmful Traditional Practices. §61 /§62. Ms Radhika Coomaraswamy is the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on children & armed conflict.
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UN webcast HERE for 2nd oral statement delivered at afternoon session (March 22) – text below
* * * * *
WORLD UNION FOR PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM
UN Human Rights Council – 16th Session (28 February-25 March)
Statement by David G. Littman 22 March (16:15am)
Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related forms of intolerance… (item 9)
1840 Ritual Blood-Libel Accusation against Judaism & Jews / Appeal to remove Father Thomas Damascus Church plaque
Sir, probably the most egregious example of religious racism and defamation has been the medieval “Blood-Libel”, the Christian accusation that Jews use human blood for unleavened bread at Passover. This libel, which targeted European Jews for centuries, was revived from 1840 in Damascus, Eastern Europe and Russia, in the Middle East by Christian communities, by the Nazis from the 1920s, and in the Arab-Muslim world for the last century.
Twenty years ago [8 February 1991], a crude revival of the “Damascus Affair Blood-Libel” was launched at the Commission when we gave a quote from the preface to Syrian Defence Minister [Major-Gen.] Mustafa Tlass’ book, The Matzah of Zion: “The Jew can kill you…and take your blood in order to make his Zionist bread…I hope that I have done my duty in presenting the practices of the enemy of our historic nation. Allah aid this project.” Exercising her right of reply, the Syrian delegate Nabila Chaalan, while waving her Minister’s book, launched “an appeal to all members of this Commission to read this very important work that demonstrates unequivocally the historical reality of Zionist racism.”
Bookstores in Damascus and especially outside tourist hotels are filled with many language copies of The Matzah of Zion, The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion and Hitler’s Mein Kampf – and similar Jew-hatred books are found in most Arab-Muslim countries, even at last month’s Siel Book Fare in Casablanca.
[The latest book is by Prof. Shams al-Din al-Ajlani, The Jews of Damascus (Librairie El-Ulbi, Damas, Arabic, 2009, pp. 430), in which he gives his version of how the Jews of Damascus savagely strangled Father Thomas (and his Muslim valet in 1840) to use his blood in the preparation of their unleavened bread for the Feast of Passover.]
[A comprehensive academic research on “The Damascus Affair” was published by the late Prof. Jonathan Frankel, The Damascus Affair: “Ritual Murder”, Politics and the Jews in 1840, Cambridge University Press, 1997, p. 491].
[Last month’s SIEL Book Fair in Casablanca (11-20 Feb. 2011], the most important in the Middle East & North Africa, had 6 other Judeophobic hate books on display; it was denounced by the Simon Wiesenthal Center (3 March).]
We hope that the resolution before the Council combating incitement to religious hatred and violence will be adopted, and that all the member states of the OIC will carefully consider the implications of this resolution for their own societies.
Finally, the 1840 epitaph to Father Thomas – replaced since 1866 in the Terra Sancta Church of Damascus – perpetuates the 1840 blood libel. May we, sir, through the good offices of the distinguished representative of the Holy See, ask Pope Benedict XVI – following his historic condemnation earlier this month of the accusation of ‘deicide’ against Jews – to now order the removal of this infamous plaque.
[Pope Paul VI de-beatified Simon of Trent in 1965, 490 years after a similar ‘Ritual Murder’ accusation, with dire consequences for Jews in Italy for nearly 5 centuries.] (3)
Sir Moses Montefiore made an Appeal to the Pope in 1840; may our Appeal 171 years later be heard, for: Magna est veritas et praevalebit / Truth is great and will ultimately prevail.
Notes:
1. See letter of Syria’s main representative of 19 Feb. 1991: E/CN.4/1991/80. At the 47th session of the Commission (1991), 29 States (14 Member and 15 Observer States) sent letters of protest to UN Chairman Enrique Bernales Ballesteros and to UN Under-Secretary-General Jan Martenson, in this order: Israel, USA, Australia, Canada, 12 Members EU, Switzerland, the 5 members of the Nordic countries, Austria, New Zealand, Japan, Czechoslavakia, Hungary & Poland (jointly); Yugoslavia. The WUPJ delivered a 14 Feb. 1991 letter to Jan Martenson and Enrique Bernales Ballesteros giving full details and signed by 7 NGOS – 4 other NGOs sent separate letters. For a full documentation see, Human Rights &Human Wrongs, N° 10& N° 11 (World Union for Progressive Judaism, Geneva, 10 June 1991 and 20 Jan. 1992) – in many libraries worldwide, including the UN in New York and Geneva. See WUPJ’s written statement: E/CN.4/1991/NGO/49 of 8 March 1991, which contains passages from the 6 Nov. 1840 firman of Sultan Abdul Mejid: “Ignorant people believe that the Jews are in the habit of making human sacrifices in order to use the blood in the (Passover) wafers….” We have more detailed documentation for delegates on this defamation of Judaism and all Jews.
2. 15th session Council, 28 Sept. 2010, and at a HRC ‘Complementary Standards’ Council meeting on 27 October 2010.
3. “In 1475 the fanatical Franciscan Bernardino da Feltre preached there [in Trent] against the Jews in his Lenten sermons, and foretold that their sins would soon be manifested to all.” (Encyclopaedia Judaica, 1971, vol. 15, p. 1374).
(CNN) – Likely presidential candidate Haley Barbour, the Mississippi governor who has faced charges of racial insensitivity in recent months, said Thursday he will seek funding from the Mississippi legislature for a civil rights museum in the state.
In a statement issued Thursday, Barbour said he will formally ask for funding for two museums – one focusing on Mississippi’s history and the other on civil rights – when the legislature returns to complete the budget.
“These museums will enhance Mississippi’s image and play a critical role in education and tourism,” the Republican governor said in a statement.
Barbour has pushed for a civil rights museum since late January, predicting then that “People from around the world would flock to see the museum and learn about the movement.”
Barbour has found himself in the middle of several controversies regarding race in the last several months, beginning in December when he told the Weekly Standard magazine that he didn’t remember segregation-era Mississippi “being that bad.”
In February, the governor again faced heat when he refused to condemn the Mississippi chapter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans after the group proposed a state-sponsored license plate honoring Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, who became an early leader of the Ku Klux Klan. Barbour however later said he would not sign the bill approving funding for the project.
He also faced fire from the state chapter of the NAACP earlier this month over the issue of redistricting, having endorsed a plan that the civil rights group alleges diminishes the influence of African-American voters in “an attempt to hijack the election process so Republicans can take over the House.”
Woman’s rights in Islam …
A 14 year old girl, Hena Akhter, was sentenced to 101 lashes from the imam from the local mosque as punishment for adultery. She was brought out into public and lashed for her crimes. According to CNN, she dropped at 70 lashes. She dies a week later from her injuries declaring in her dying words to her mother that she was innocent.
Want to know what passes for female adultery? How about being raped. As stated at Patterico’s Pontifications, could there be a more barbaric interpretation to adultery. A woman to prove she was raped cannot do so without four witnesses to back her up. What!
Many months later on a winter night, as Hena’s sister Alya told it, Hena was walking from her room to an outdoor toilet when Mahbub Khan gagged her with cloth, forced her behind nearby shrubbery and beat and raped her.
Hena struggled to escape, Alya told CNN. Mahbub Khan’s wife heard Hena’s muffled screams and when she found Hena with her husband, she dragged the teenage girl back to her hut, beat her and trampled her on the floor.
The next day, the village elders met to discuss the case at Mahbub Khan’s house, Alya said. The imam pronounced his fatwa. Khan and Hena were found guilty of an illicit relationship. Her punishment under sharia or Islamic law was 101 lashes; his 201.
Ohio’s Republican-controlled legislature passed legislation that would “curb the collective bargaining rights of about 350,000 state employees, and Gov. John Kasich (R) said he will sign it into law,” according to Reuters.
“Similar measures have spurred protests in Wisconsin, Tennessee, Michigan and other states. Ohio Democrats hope to put the new law on the ballot for a referendum vote in November in an effort to overturn it… While Wisconsin has gained more national attention, Ohio is far more important to unions. It has the sixth largest number of public sector union members among all the 50 U.S. states, twice the number of Wisconsin. With many auto and steel and manufacturing plants, Ohio is also a union bellwether.”
Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire
So states VC Leo Strine in Fletcher Int’l v. Ion Geophysical Corp. Edward McNally explains that:
Fletcher International LTD v. Ion Geophysical Corp., C.A. 5109-VCS (March 29, 2011)
This is another in the line of decisions that stress that preferred stockholder rights are what is set out in the certificate of incorporation and nothing more. Thus, if the preferred stockholders bargain for the right to consent to the sale of stock by any subsidiary, then they do not also have the right to vote on the sale of subsidiary stock by the parent.
Specifically Strine opined that:
In Delaware, a preferred stockholder’s rights “are contractual in nature.”27 Where the language governing the preferred stockholder’s rights is “clear and unambiguous, it must be given its plain meaning.”28 Furthermore, such rights “are to be strictly construed and must be expressly contained in the relevant certificates.”29
27 In re Appraisal of Metromedia Int’l Group, Inc., 971 A.2d 893, 899 (Del. Ch. 2009) (citing Matulich v. Aegis Commc’ns Group, Inc., 942 A.2d 596, 600 (Del. 2008)).
28 Benihana of Tokyo, Inc. v. Benihana, Inc., 906 A.2d 114, 120 (Del. 2006) (citing Northwestern Nat’l Ins. Co. v. Esmark, Inc., 672 A.2d 41, 43 (Del. 1996)).
29 Waggoner v. Laster, 581 A.2d 1127, 1134 (Del. 1990). See also Baron v. Allied Artists Pictures Corp., 337 A.2d 653, 657 (Del. Ch. 1975).
What’s interesting to me is that no where in the opinion does the dread word “Jedwab” appear. A few years ago, I wrote a very long blog post on the rights of preferred stockholders, in which I discussed former Delaware Chancellor Allen’s opinion in Jedwab v. MGM Grand Hotels, Inc., 509 A.2d 584 (Del. Ch. 1986), which held that directors owe fiduciary duties to preferred stockholders as well as common stockholders where the right claimed by the preferred “is not to a preference as against the common stock but rather a right shared equally with the common.” Presumably, since the specific claims at issue did not allege a breach of fiduciary duty, Strine did not feel it necessary to address that issue. Still, it’s at least a little curious that the scholarly Strine-who frequently offers up interesting dicta in his many long textual footnotes (of which this opinion has several) did not even mention the Jedwab issue.
Is it too much to hope that Delaware courts may finally be waking up to the myriad of ways in which Jedwab is inconsistent with Delaware Supreme Court precedent and, moreover, just plain bad policy?
Written by Andy Yee
As the world’s attention is focusing on the Middle East and North Africa, crackdown on human rights activists in China is continuing unabated following online calls for ‘Jasmine Revolution’. C. Custer at ChinaGeeks documented a list of people who have disappeared last month, and Geng He, wife of missing lawyer Gao Zhisheng, called for the international community to speak up against China’s abuse of human rights in The New York Times.
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Faith communities across the nation will stand alongside working people, civil rights groups, students and immigrants on the days around April 4 to tell hard-working families under attack that “We Are One.”
In a telephone press conference this afternoon, prominent African American and evangelical faith leaders joined with civil rights and labor leaders to announce coordinated actions this weekend and on April 4 in support of working families.
AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker told the reporters that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s power grab reignited a huge movement of people standing up for human dignity and human rights. Holt Baker, who also is a member of the Interfaith Worker Justice (IWJ) national board, said:
We’re standing together to make our country better for all working people. We honor Dr. King with our determination to stand up and build the future our children deserve. These attacks on the middle class aren’t about the economy or the state budget. It’s about politics and payback.
IWJ has produced a set of resources for the We Are One mobilization-prayers, sermons, a bulletin insert, and pieces on what congregations, students, and worker centers can do.
Rev. Nelson Rivers, vice president of the NAACP, said the right-wing is engaged in a “gigantic effort to turn the clock back.” He said the NAACP will hold a major national event in Nashville, Tenn., April 4 featuring a teach-in with three historically black colleges in that city.
“We know that God is concerned about workers, who are consistently vulnerable to exploitation if they aren’t protected. When workers are treated badly, that matters to us, no matter what faith tradition we come from—including the evangelical community,” said Rev. Troy Jackson, pastor of University Christian Church in Cincinnati.
IWJ is coordinating with dozens of groups holding prayer vigils in multiple locations across the country, using the same prayer for workers (available here) around the We Are One faith events happening April 1-4 and into the coming weeks. Events include:
- A rally and candlelight vigil with Jewish, Muslim and Christian leaders and a choir at Denver City Park from 5:30-7:30 p.m. on April 4.
- An April 4 rally and press conference at the Martin Luther King, Jr. and Coretta Scott King Memorial Plaza on the campus of the University of Maine.
- Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice will hold a theatrical reenactment of biblical passages around worker justice in San Diego on April 4.
- Detroit Interfaith Worker Justice will hold a prayer vigil in concert with labor union rallies on April 4.
You can also find out how to take action on April 4 or write a message of solidarity to workers at the “We Are One” Facebook page. Follow the action on Twitter with the hashtags #statesSOS, #notmywi, #StandUpOH, #wiunion and get the latest updates at www.aflcio.org/blog.
Many in the West will assume equal rights for Christians will happen more or less automatically, or are not truly an issue under Sharia law, which apologists portray as a complex system that shape-shifts like the goop in a lava lamp the moment some skeptical non-Muslim observes something unpleasant about human rights.
Outside of the West, non-Muslims know better, and they know from experience as well as the content of Islamic texts: Sharia is a vehicle for Islamic supremacism and the subjugation of non-believers. Therefore, constitutions that set Sharia as the supreme law of the land (as with Article 2 of Egypt’s constitution) have written inequality for non-believers into their national DNA, so to speak.
Archbishop Sako has warned before that the West indeed cannot fully grasp the dangers of Islamization, a danger heightened by blind faith in “democracy” alone to ensure respect for human rights. “True Democracy in Muslim Countries Only If Christians Are Equal Citizens,” Says Assyrian Bishop,” by Joseph Mahmoud for Asia News, March 29:
Würzburg — “Aid to the Church in Need” organised a world conference titled “Welt Kirche in Würzburg”, in Germany on 18-20 March 2011, on the situation of Christians in Muslim counties. Many bishops from Egypt, Pakistan, Iraq and Nigeria and elsewhere took part in the event. Mgr Louis Sako, archbishop of Kirkuk, was among them. He expressed serious concerns about how ‘Jasmine Revolutions’ were developing in many countries of North Africa and the Middle East.
The Chaldean prelate saw few signs of optimism in the events now unfolding in Arab countries, like mass protests and popular unrest, which have front-page in newscasts, newspapers, magazines and websites. The sight of crowds praying or shouting slogans gives the impression of a wave of extremism.
Media are always talking about Islamic parties. Many Muslims want an Islamic state. After the collapse of regime that lacked a direction and vision, questions abound. Will things improve? Will there be security? Who comes next? Who is pushing these masses of young people? Who is funding the movement? I hope things will evolved differently in Iraq.
The bishop described the situation in Iraq, where for the past eight years, “we have lived with different kinds of oppression. Establishing freedom and democracy takes time and education, especially a separation between politics, which is based on interests, and religion, which is based on ideals that cannot be compromised.”
“Democracy cannot function if Islam is not updated. We must work together for a civilian state in which the only criterion is citizenship,” he said.
“In Iraq, the post-Saddam government, and the people, have proclaimed democracy, but democracy cannot be imposed by pushing a magic button. Eight years after the US invasion, we do not have democracy in Iraq. Indeed, we have groups fighting each. Instead of democracy, we have a growing sectarian problem, with expulsions, abductions and attacks.”
“We Christians are at a disadvantage, socially and religiously discriminated. More than half of the country’s Christians have left, but others are leaving as well. The exodus is never-ending. If Islamisation continues, there will be no Christians left. A million Christians used to live here; now 400,000 are left. Christians certainly respect Muslims, but Muslims must also recognise Christians are real citizens, not as second-class citizens. There must be a clear and courageous decision by the state, as well as Muslim authorities.”
In fact, Mgr Sako issued an appeal to Muslim authorities. “It is necessary,” he said, “that Muslim religious leaders get involved in dialogue to build a multicultural and multi-religious society and reduce inter-religious tensions and conflicts so as to build true coexistence. Sectarian and provocative speeches do not help humanity’s development and are contrary to the universal religious message of ‘Peace on earth’.”
“We must work together for a civilian state in which the only criterion is citizenship. The government, police, army, courts and all institutions should uphold the law and maintain order among all citizens.”
Many in the West will assume equal rights for Christians will happen more or less automatically, or are not truly an issue under Sharia law, which apologists portray as a complex system that shape-shifts like the goop in a lava lamp the moment some skeptical non-Muslim observes something unpleasant about human rights.
Outside of the West, non-Muslims know better, and they know from experience as well as the content of Islamic texts: Sharia is a vehicle for Islamic supremacism and the subjugation of non-believers. Therefore, constitutions that set Sharia as the supreme law of the land (as with Article 2 of Egypt’s constitution) have written inequality for non-believers into their national DNA, so to speak.
Archbishop Sako has warned before that the West indeed cannot fully grasp the dangers of Islamization, a danger heightened by blind faith in “democracy” alone to ensure respect for human rights. “True Democracy in Muslim Countries Only If Christians Are Equal Citizens,” Says Assyrian Bishop,” by Joseph Mahmoud for Asia News, March 29:
Würzburg — “Aid to the Church in Need” organised a world conference titled “Welt Kirche in Würzburg”, in Germany on 18-20 March 2011, on the situation of Christians in Muslim counties. Many bishops from Egypt, Pakistan, Iraq and Nigeria and elsewhere took part in the event. Mgr Louis Sako, archbishop of Kirkuk, was among them. He expressed serious concerns about how ‘Jasmine Revolutions’ were developing in many countries of North Africa and the Middle East.
The Chaldean prelate saw few signs of optimism in the events now unfolding in Arab countries, like mass protests and popular unrest, which have front-page in newscasts, newspapers, magazines and websites. The sight of crowds praying or shouting slogans gives the impression of a wave of extremism.
Media are always talking about Islamic parties. Many Muslims want an Islamic state. After the collapse of regime that lacked a direction and vision, questions abound. Will things improve? Will there be security? Who comes next? Who is pushing these masses of young people? Who is funding the movement? I hope things will evolved differently in Iraq.
The bishop described the situation in Iraq, where for the past eight years, “we have lived with different kinds of oppression. Establishing freedom and democracy takes time and education, especially a separation between politics, which is based on interests, and religion, which is based on ideals that cannot be compromised.”
“Democracy cannot function if Islam is not updated. We must work together for a civilian state in which the only criterion is citizenship,” he said.
“In Iraq, the post-Saddam government, and the people, have proclaimed democracy, but democracy cannot be imposed by pushing a magic button. Eight years after the US invasion, we do not have democracy in Iraq. Indeed, we have groups fighting each. Instead of democracy, we have a growing sectarian problem, with expulsions, abductions and attacks.”
“We Christians are at a disadvantage, socially and religiously discriminated. More than half of the country’s Christians have left, but others are leaving as well. The exodus is never-ending. If Islamisation continues, there will be no Christians left. A million Christians used to live here; now 400,000 are left. Christians certainly respect Muslims, but Muslims must also recognise Christians are real citizens, not as second-class citizens. There must be a clear and courageous decision by the state, as well as Muslim authorities.”
In fact, Mgr Sako issued an appeal to Muslim authorities. “It is necessary,” he said, “that Muslim religious leaders get involved in dialogue to build a multicultural and multi-religious society and reduce inter-religious tensions and conflicts so as to build true coexistence. Sectarian and provocative speeches do not help humanity’s development and are contrary to the universal religious message of ‘Peace on earth’.”
“We must work together for a civilian state in which the only criterion is citizenship. The government, police, army, courts and all institutions should uphold the law and maintain order among all citizens.”
No one seems to have much love for the No Child Left Behind Act these days. But everyone seems to agree on the best feature of the law: Schools now have to show how student subgroups that historically were ignored (English-language learners, racial minorities, economically disadvantaged students) are doing relative to their peers.
But it sounds like some civil rights and advocacy organizations are worried about that part of the law being weakened in the upcoming reauthorization of the law, as policymakers try to give states more flexibility overall.
Now a long and varied list of advocacy groups, including Democrats for Education Reform, The Education Trust, the Center for American Progress Action Fund, the National Council of La Raza, the NewSchools Venture Fund, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce have sent a cautionary letter on that subject to U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and lawmakers overseeing reauthorization on Capitol Hill.
Here’s a snippet from the letter:
We, like President Obama and many Congressional leaders, want a speedy and bipartisan reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, preferably before the beginning of the 2011-12 school year. But we also want to ensure that the law keeps its commitment to the children and schools it was designed to serve. … We need to ensure that the academic achievement of historically disadvantaged students is an intrinsic part of any accountability system.
Here are some of the policies the groups want to see in the new version of ESEA:
1) All students be held to the same college- and-career ready standards, regardless of subgroup.
2) Proper adaptions, accommodations, and assessments be maintained for students with disabilities and ELLs.
3) States continue to set annual, measurable, and ambitious goals for the academic growth and performance of all students and for closing achievement and graduation gaps between all students and subgroups, including economically disadvantaged students, racial minorities, and ELLs.
4) Districts be held accountable for supporting schools and closing district-wide achievement gaps.
5) States and districts make transparency “paramount,” and parents be given a right to know how their children are performing.
Why this letter now?
Advocates have been worried about some of the signals they’ve seen lately from the administration on this issue, most notably the claim that more than 80 percent of schools are “failing,” a statistic the administration says is unfair and an indication of why the law needs to be updated.
But many of those schools are being labeled as not meeting achievement targets because of subgroup performance, advocates say.
Raul Gonzales, the director of legislative affairs for the National Council of La Raza, told me in an interview last week that he does “believe the administration is committed to closing gaps.” But he worries that without strong subgroup accountability, states and districts might not focus on schools where minorities and special populations (such as ELLs) are lagging behind their peers even though the schools are doing well overall.
“If I’m a state and I have limited funds and hard choices to make, if there’s hard accountability for the bottom 5 percent, that’s where I’m placing my emphasis,” he said. “There’s a lot of uncertainty. We’re not in a place right now where we’re comfortable with where ELLs may end up with regard to accountability. … It’s important for the administration to clarify what they mean” when it comes to subgroup accountability.
The department just received the letter today, so I’m guessing officials haven’t had a chance to comment. But here’s what Sandra Abrevaya, a spokeswoman for Secretary Duncan, told me last week when I asked about the subgroup issue: “Subgroup accountability is critically important to the department. We frequently highlight schools that have made gains across all subgroups.”
She added that Duncan “says consistently that the most important thing that NCLB did was to create subgroup accountability. That’s one of the things that we’ve time and time again said we’re going to maintain.”
A foreign policy adviser to President Obama said this evening that the Administration has "rehabilitated" the concept of human rights, tarnished by the Iraq war, in a way that laid the groundwork for international collaboration.
Samantha Power, a senior director on the National Security Council best known for her human rights advocacy before she entered the White House, spoke at Columbia University in New York City two hours before the president’s planned speech in Libya tonight.
Obama "has used his pulpit and a number of speeches … to kind of clear the brush that had gathered around the norms in previous years, rehabilitating some of the principles and cleaning up some fo the associations," she said, referring to international values of democracy and human rights.
"The words ‘democracy’ and ‘human rights’ have come to acquire meaning and content that Barack Obama and his administration provided," she said.
"His success in rehabilitating those norms or providing that ocntent has actually made it easier for other governments to stand with us," she said. She didn’t refer directly to the coalition now battling the Libyan government.
One of the key elements of this "clearing of the brush," she said, had been "recognizing that human rights had to begin at home, and that his task and the Administration’s task was to strenghten the power of our example."
She cited Obama’s torture bank, his "return to the Geneva Conventions, and his push to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center.
"He also renounced the imposition of democracy by military force," she said.
Power also made the case that the American decision to return to the United Nations Human Rights Council — a venue disliked by the U.S. for its focus on criticism of Israel — has paid off in the Libya crisis with the Council’s expulsion of Libya.
"We were ale to use some of what the Council offered as a way of compounding the Qadhafi regime’s isolation in the early days of this crisis," she said, making the case that the Council is "a venue that we’re using more and more to do traditional business. This advanced the U.S.’s foreign policy aims in the moment, it isn’t just a small boutique place where human rights concerns are raised nad rejected."
Power also defended the speed of the Administration’s response to the Libyan civil conflict, which she contrasted to the slow international response in Bosnia.
"When it was clear that [diplomatic and legal] tools would not be enough to prevent the fall of Benghazi," she said, "the president mobilized an international coalition."
She noted that it took a year for the international community to impose asset freezes on Bosnian Serb war criminals and two years to impose travel bans, acts which took nine days in Libya.
"In the Balkans it took three years for the international community to use air power to prevent heavy weapns from firing on civilians," she said. "In Libya it took a little more than a month."
ThinkProgress filed this report from the Conservative Principles Conference in Des Moines, IA.
The defining political story three months into 2011 is the spread of anti-union legislation in the states. Now, a leading senator on the right wants to eliminate collective bargaining rights at a federal level.
During an interview with ThinkProgress in Des Moines this weekend, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), a leader of the Tea Party movement and veritable kingmaker for conservative candidates, made no bones about his desire to diminish the power of public employees. DeMint told ThinkProgress that he “doesn’t believe collective bargaining has any place in government…including at the federal level.” The South Carolina senator then went on to call public employees’ unions an “unelected third party” that enjoyed “monopoly power” in negotiations. “It just doesn’t make any sense,” DeMint quipped:
KEYES: Senator, would you like to see some of these bills that we see at a state level curbing the collective bargaining rights of public employees’ unions, would you like to see those on a federal level?
DeMINT: I don’t believe collective bargaining has any place in government.
KEYES: Including at a federal level?
DeMINT: Including at the federal level. That’s what elections are, collective bargaining, for people who are [inaudible]. I think it just doesn’t make sense. When we’re elected as representatives, to determine the fiscal condition of the government, then to have an unelected third party bargaining at the table with monopoly power, it just doesn’t make any sense.
Watch it:
Currently, most federal public employees – with the exception of the postal service and some others – are only permitted to collectively bargain to improve their working conditions (their pay and benefits are set by Congress). However, DeMint is apparently seeking to take away even the meager rights that federal employees currently have.
The South Carolina Republican’s push to strip public employees’ unions of all their collective bargaining rights is part of a larger battle by the GOP against labor unions. Currently, the right is targeting labor unions in states across the country, from Maine to Missouri and elsewhere, with nearly-identical legislation crafted by the Koch-funded American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). Earlier this month, Wisconsin State Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R) even admitted to Fox News on air that the goal is to defund labor unions and hurt President Obama’s reelection chances.
Now, as the fight over public unions expands to more states, Sen. Jim DeMint is picking up the torch for at a federal level.
(Eugene Volokh)
The case is In re Marriage of Mendlowitz. The alleged slanders were an e-mail and a letter to the estranged wife’s business associates that seemed likely to interfere with her business relationships. They might indeed have led to a successful defamation lawsuit, and a lawsuit for interference with business relations. But a trial court judge went so far as to issue a domestic restraining order against such comments:
[Y]ou are disturbing the peace of the petitioner…. You have, by your own testimony, admitted to the defaming comments that you have made in these emails. And so therefore, the court is going to grant a restraining order for the next five years. You are not to contact [the wife], [her] employers, [her] potential employers in regard to [her] … You are not to contact any third parties in regard to [the wife], her reputation, her past acts.
This meant that any prohibited speech about his wife would be a crime. And because the order included boilerplate language ordering the estranged husband not to “harass, attack, strike, threaten, assault (sexually or otherwise), hit, follow, stalk, molest, destroy personal property, disturb the peace, keep under surveillance, or block movements,” the federal ban on gun possession by people who are the targets of restraining orders kicked in. (See PDF pp. 61–65 of my Implementing the Right to Keep and Bear Arms in Self-Defense article.)
Fortunately, the California Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s decision, concluding that this sort of alleged defamation isn’t sufficient to justify issuing such an order. Unfortunately, for the nearly two years between the trial court decision and the appellate decision, defendant had been entirely deprived of his Second Amendment rights, and been subjected to a prior restraint in violation of his First Amendment rights.
