Oct 05, 2005 (AP Online via COMTEX) — Excerpts from recent editorials in newspapers in the United States and abroad:
Oct. 3
The Blade, Toledo, Ohio, on the new Supreme Court chief justice:
The Supreme Court has a new chief justice, John G. Roberts, Jr., whose tenure may well change the philosophical direction of the court. But his first order of business ought to be about breaking with the past in a practical way: He ought to urge his fellow justices to accept televising the court’s proceedings.
Chief Justice Roberts was asked about this in his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. … He indicated that he had an open mind about allowing cameras but would need to consult with his colleagues. …
In the wake of controversial decisions, the whole federal judiciary – and no part more so than the Supreme Court – has been under attack and scrutiny, some of it directed by unconscionable politicians. … The least helpful thing to do in these times is to keep out a modern means of communication that could provide the American public with a much-needed civics lesson. …
The U.S. Judicial Conference already allows cameras in appeals courts, but each federal circuit must decide for itself. A couple of jurisdictions have taken advantage of this opportunity. Others might take their lead from the Supreme Court if it were to allow cameras. …
—
On the Net:
http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051003/OPINI ON02/510
030314/-1/OPINION
—
Oct. 3
The Miami Herald, on saving the Endangered Species Act:
The revisions to the 32-year-old Endangered Species Act approved by the House of Representatives by a 229 to 193 vote last week were a sellout of the very creatures the law is supposed to protect.
If the Senate were to go along with this bill, it would reverse three decades of progressive actions that have restored American bald eagles and condors; and Florida panthers, manatees and Key deer, to name just a few.
The most successful tool for rescuing and restoring healthy populations of endangered species is to preserve their habitat. Yet the House bill would eliminate the current system of designating critical habitat that is determined to be crucial to an animal species’ survival.
The House bill also takes aim at science. Currently, the Act’s rules call for using “the best available science” and relying on scientists to determine these criteria when deciding if a species is endangered and how to protect it. The House voted instead to give the secretary of the Interior Department, a political appointee, the power to define what scientific evidence can or can’t be used to determine species protection.
Fortunately, there is precedent for the Senate to follow if it is to save the Act from this irresponsible revision. In 1978, in reaction to a Supreme Court decision that stopped construction of a dam to protect the snail darter, an endangered fish, the House passed a bill that virtually crippled the Endangered Species Act. The Senate, acknowledging that some complaints were valid, made wise revisions to the law but spurned the House’s extreme measures. The Senate must again come to the rescue of the Act, and the many creatures that the law can save.
—
On the Net:
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/
—
Sept. 29
The Buffalo (N.Y.) News, on DeLay’s indictment:
Indictment of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay is hardly surprising – though not, as the Republican’s apologists insist, because the prosecutor in charge is a Democrat. This is about DeLay and nobody else. The former exterminator from Sugar Land, Texas, has repeatedly shown himself to be utterly bereft of ethics; he is the living incarnation of Vince Lombardi’s cynical dictum that winning is the “only thing.” …
The charge announced Wednesday accuses DeLay and two associates of a criminal conspiracy to violate state campaign finance laws outlawing corporate contributions. Criminal conspiracy is a state felony punishable by six months to two years in a state jail and a fine of up to $10,000. The potential two-year sentence forces DeLay to step down under House Republican rules.
It may not sound like much, but if Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle can prove that DeLay knowingly violated the law, it will be politically hazardous for Republicans to continue supporting him as a leader.
Not that they haven’t tried. As Earle’s investigation began to focus on their unethical leader, Republicans changed procedural rules that would have required DeLay to step down if he were indicted. An avalanche of criticism followed, and Republicans repealed the change. On Wednesday, DeLay temporarily stepped aside.
His fellow Texan, President Bush, has a lot at stake here as well, saying Wednesday what all presidents say when an ally gets in trouble: Let the legal process work. But with Bush’s handling of the Iraq War and the mess from two hurricanes already pulling down the president’s poll numbers, this won’t help. …
The sound you hear is that of chickens coming home to roost.
—
On the Net:
www.buffalonews.com
—
Oct. 4
The Leaf-Chronicle, Clarksville, Tenn., on Bush’s new Supreme Court nomination:
President Bush demonstrated Monday that he still has some tricks up his sleeve. He went with a Supreme Court pick that virtually no one was expecting.
White House Counsel Harriet Miers has no judicial experience, and which Bush mentioned in his appointment announcement. He reflected on something the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist had written about drawing from a wide diversity of professional backgrounds.
In Miers, 60, Bush is going with an old friend from Texas. She was the first woman to serve as president of the Texas State Bar and the Dallas Bar Association. She also was Bush’s personal lawyer in Texas and served a six-year term on the Texas Lottery Commission.
Because she has no judicial record to endlessly pick apart, Democrats will have trouble in trying to block her nomination. They will, undoubtedly, attempt to get copies of opinions she’s written for the president, and the White House will cite executive privilege. And so the nomination dance will go.
On the conservative side, some were hoping for a nominee with a clearer record on the social issues – such as abortion – that are their primary concerns. Still, their reaction to the nomination was positive.
Assuming the nomination is approved, Miers and new Chief Justice John Roberts could swing the court to the right. That, of course, remains speculation for now. But one thing is certain, with these two crucial picks, the influence of George W. Bush will be felt for years, long after he has left office.
—
On the Net:
http://www.theleafchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=OPINI ON
—
Oct. 4:
The Goshen (Ind.) News, on William Bennett’s recent remarks:
William Bennett, America’s former education secretary and drug czar, is again the target of critical scorn. This time the flak is unwarranted.
Bennett’s detractors are angry about remarks he made on his “Morning in America” show. According to a hypothesis in a recent book, one reason the crime rate is down is because abortion has been legal for 30-plus years. In other words, fewer unwanted babies yields fewer criminals. Bennett took that line of thinking to task on his radio program.
“… I do know that it’s true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down,” he said.
Bennett went on to call that approach “an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do.”
Bennett’s argument is sound, though he should have added that “black babies” don’t have a monopoly on criminal potential. Wholesale abortion – be the aborted black, white, etc. – would drain the pool of future lawbreakers. That’s simple math, not racial hatred. It’s also, to borrow from Bennett, reprehensible.
William Bennett didn’t play a “race card.” Those who are predisposed to dislike people like William Bennett did.
—
On the Net:
http://www.goshennews.com/
—
Oct. 3
Seattle Post-Intelligencer, on journalist Judith Miller:
It’s refreshing to see an American journalist cast as a heroine – even an imperfect one.
The New York Times’ Judith Miller was jailed 85 days for refusing to disclose the identity of a confidential source.
It’s an outrage that Miller had to spend a moment in jail, especially to cover for an administration snitch.
Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, the prosecutor in the case of who “outed” CIA operative Valerie Plame, characterized Miller’s testimony as key to his investigation. Well, it had better be. Fitzgerald has a White House full of officials and employees presumably happy to cooperate in the pursuit of a federal criminal case (with perhaps the exception of the one who committed the crime). He also has several other journalists who were contacted by administration officials about Plame.
We’re fascinated to learn what otherwise unattainable nugget of evidence Miller possessed that Fitzpatrick was willing to imprison her to obtain.
Now let’s see the prosecutor pursue the real lawbreakers with comparable zeal.
“I went to jail to preserve the time-honored principle that a journalist must respect a promise not to reveal the identity of a confidential source,” Miller said after her release. “The principle was more important to uphold than my personal freedom.”
Bravo!
—
On the Net:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/242941-millered.html
—
Oct. 3
Star Tribune, Minneapolis, on World Bank debt relief:
In his first major test as the new president of the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz has achieved something everyone can praise: He pressured the world’s wealthiest nations into forgiving $40 billion owed to the bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) by the world’s poorest nations, most of them in Africa.
Initially, the debt relief will apply to the 18 poorest nations, freeing up billions of dollars they can use for education, infrastructure development and coping with the AIDS epidemic rather than payments on debt principal and interest to the international bodies. However, an additional 20 countries could be added to the program if they meet benchmarks for good governance. That would bring the total debt relief to a potential $57 billion. …
Wolfowitz twisted many G8 arms, including those of former colleagues in the Bush administration, to pledge that they would make contributions to finance the debt relief over and above their regular contributions to the international bodies. …
No one ever doubted that Wolfowitz was smart; he’s downright brilliant, when he doesn’t allow ideology to cloud his judgment. … With his dedication and smarts and vigor, it’s entirely possible that, come December, actual agreements will be tabled in Hong Kong for implementing the goals agreed to in Doha. Everyone who cares that the poorest of the poor nations get a chance to compete fairly in the world markets should pray that Wolfowitz comes through on trade as he has on debt.
—
On the Net:
www.startribune.com
—
Oct. 4
Salt Lake Tribune, on disaster preparedness:
Poor and minority victims of Hurricane Katrina were disproportionately harmed because, in many cases, they were left out of the evacuation and rescue loop. That is why we find complaints that Salt Lake Valley immigrant and minority populations have been neglected in local disaster preparedness plans especially troubling.
However, equally problematic is the fact that too many residents generally are uninformed about a master plan for disasters. Since an earthquake is the most likely large-scale disaster in Utah, residents should know what their leaders have in mind to deal with the devastation to communication, transportation and public health systems that will occur when The Big One hits, as it surely will one day.
We have been told that hospitals and medical-care providers have a plan, along with the Utah Department of Health, to take care of large numbers of injured people. But all Utahns need easily obtainable answers to such basic questions as: Where do I go? How do I get information? How do I get help? How can I help others? …
Perhaps the most helpful lesson is that we all should assume we will be on our own, at least for a few days, after a disaster hits. Stocking supplies of water and food, first-aid and medical items, fuel and cash and keeping important documents handy is good advice for everyone. But for those who lack the means to gather basic necessities, Utah needs another plan.
—
On the Net:
http://www.sltrib.com/opinion/ci-3087767
—
Oct. 4
Financial Times, London, on Bush’s perplexing stealth pick:
President George W. Bush’s choice of Harriet Miers, White House legal counsel, for the vacancy on the Supreme Court left by the recently retired Sandra Day O’Connor, is perplexing – not least for his conservative supporters.
After the successful installation of John Roberts as Chief Justice there was no more eagerly anticipated decision. Conservatives and the religious right expected Mr. Bush to use this pivotal position to tilt the court in their direction for the next generation. Liberals have been preparing to do battle to prevent precisely that outcome.
Both sides will have to wait some time to judge what this choice portends, because the president has reached into his intensely loyal inner circle and pulled out someone with no judicial record at all. Although he was widely expected to replace a woman with another woman on the bench, this is being seen as a “stealth pick.” That is quite a gamble at a time when Mr. Bush is desperately trying to regain the initiative and re-establish his leadership credentials after Hurricane Katrina and amid collapsing domestic support for the war in Iraq.
Ms. Miers is a lawyer with a background in corporate cases who once headed the Texas bar association. But she has never been a judge. She became attached to Mr. Bush’s entourage when, as governor of Texas, he appointed her head of the state lottery commission. He once described her as “a pit bull in size six shoes.” Nominating her yesterday, he underlined that she would “strictly interpret our constitution and our laws. She will not legislate from the bench.”
That is pretty much the position staked out by Chief Justice Roberts at his confirmation hearings. He intimated that, whatever his private views, he would eschew judicial activism and interpret law with rigorous respect for its corpus of precedents. Yet Mr. Roberts, a mainstream conservative with impeccable legal credentials, still had half the Democrats in the Senate vote against him. Ms. Miers, by contrast, is an unknown quantity. The Republican right, feeling entitled to one of their own in this vacancy, is sounding at best underwhelmed, worried about what it does not know about Mr. Bush’s choice. The Democrats are in the same position. They will conduct a forensic investigation into Ms. Miers’ record and will almost certainly try to fit her into a presidential pattern of appointing cronies to sensitive positions.
Just how sensitive will become apparent as and when difficult and divisive issues such as abortion, federal versus states’ rights or the death penalty come before the court.
The stage is set for drawn-out confirmation hearings, which is where Ms. Miers will have to earn her elevation. For all Mr. Bush’s habitual effusiveness towards those in his tight circle of admirers, there is little to suggest she is Supreme Court justice material, so far. She has everything to prove.
—
On the Net:
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/8b23af1a-3472-11da-adae-00000e2511c8.html
—
Oct. 5 La Repubblica, Rome, on religious authorities taking political positions:
The boundary between the public sphere and the religious one has always been controversial.
The dispute is … whether religious authorities can take political positions. The Church’s ability to gain support varies, depending on the more or less close tie (of the issue) with the original evangelic message.
When the Church hangs itself onto the original values, when it calls for the expansion of the charity frontiers, when it works to solve conflicts peacefully, when it effectively acts in favor of the poor and of the afflicted, only then it keeps all of its faithful and breaks the front of the nonbelievers.
On the contrary, it loses ground … when it pronounces itself on the values of the unity of the family, which are not in the original evangelic message.
—
On the Net:
http://www.repubblica.it
—
Oct. 5
Sueddeutsche Zeitung, Munich, Germany, on the Palestinian leadership:
Is the Gaza Strip, evacuated by Israeli settlers, the seed of an independent Palestinian state or only a starting point for a bloody conflict between its political and military factions?
The latest events, which again saw Palestinians shooting at Palestinians, give no cause for optimism. …
People die, the government wobbles and the president stands there like a helpless political clown.
The reasons for the chaos are known. Militants from Hamas and Islamic Jihad are leading an armed life of their own.
The rudimentary and corruption-ridden state has neither the will nor the ability to achieve peace, security and order. And as if that were not enough, Israel often enough deliberately pours fuel onto the Palestinian fire from outside. …
So far, Gaza is not a successful model. The chances that it will become one are shrinking.
—
On the Net:
http://www.sueddeutsche.de/
—
Oct. 2
Asahi Shimbun, Tokyo, on Korean forced laborers:
Japan must return the remains of Korean forced laborers.
Through the end of the war in 1945, Japanese companies conscripted a large number of individuals from the Korean Peninsula as forced laborers. Many of them eventually died in this country.
Now, for the first time, Tokyo has informed the government in Seoul that the remains of 868 such Koreans have been located in various regions throughout Japan. Naturally, this number comprises only a tiny fraction of the overall total of those ordered into labor.
But much of this sad page of history remains cloudy, with the question of how the remains of the many that died were laid to rest. Whether names were even properly recorded also goes unanswered.
The very nature of this matter means that Seoul’s request cannot be glossed over or left on the back burner. We believe that the very morality of postwar Japan is being put to an acid test by this appeal from South Korea. Many of the companies that took part in the actual hiring no longer exist. Also, there is no question that supporting documentation has become hopelessly scattered or lost forever. In that sense, this is truly a battle against time.
To help nurture more fruitful relations between the two countries from here on, Japan must strive to reflect humbly on its own past, and take every possible step to now do the right thing.
—
On the Net:
http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200510030105.html
—
Oct. 3
Aftenposten, Oslo, Norway, on immigration from Africa:
When hundreds of Africans storm the border fences around the Spanish enclave in Morocco, and when live shots are fired with people killed, Europe’s border problem ended up with a new dimension.
The tragedy on Europe’s only border with Africa will force Europe to harmonize immigration policies. The United States can teach us about that. There, immigration steadily made the nation stronger (and) … helped form American society. It will be like that in Europe.
It is not easy to find a middle way between open borders and ‘Fortress Europe.” …
The only solution, in a very long term perspective, is economic growth in Africa. It is young people’s, especially young men’s, lack of economic opportunity that drives emigration.
In truth, decades of aid have not led to conditions that make new generations want to stay home.
Our hope is that the disturbing images from the border fences in Morocco will lead to more effective and comprehensive help, as well as tight cooperation between African, European and other governments.
—
On the Net:
www.aftenposten.no
—
Oct. 4
Winnipeg Free Press, Canada, on death in Bali:
Three years after the previous nightclub bombing on the Indonesian island of Bali, terrorists struck again on Saturday. Three suicide bombers wearing explosives blew themselves up, killing between 20 and 30 people and injuring 104.
The purpose of this weekend’s attack and of the Oct. 12, 2002 attack, in which 202 were killed and a further 209 injured, may have been to frighten tourists away from the beach resort. But the terror effect was clearly short-lived because the resort was once again filled with holiday-makers.
The death toll in the latest attack was uncertain because the authorities were recovering dismembered body parts and it was not immediately obvious how many people had died. A hospital yesterday said 29 and the police commander said 22. Either way, the toll was far less than three years ago.
A similar decline in lethal power of terrorist attacks has been seen in western Europe. The commuter train bombings in Madrid in March 2004 killed 191 people and injured 1,500 while the July bus and underground attacks in London this year killed 56 and injured about 700. These are terrible crimes in which civilians die for somebody’s political campaign.
Governments of all countries have to be alert to the efforts of fanatics. The evidence suggests, however, that anti-terror efforts are bearing fruit, because the terrorists have nothing like the power they seemed to have when the twin towers of the World Trade Centre were destroyed in September 2001. Terrorist havens have been eliminated.
Bank transfers between terror agents and their employers have been impeded. Air travelers are much more carefully watched. We have all paid a price in privacy and civil liberties, but at least the terrorists have been weakened and the death tolls have shrunk. The war may continue a long time yet, but at the moment the terrorists are losing.
—
On the Net:
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/
—
Oct. 5
Jordan Times, on the EU and Turkey:
After some 40 years of trying, Turkey has just about made it. The European Union decided in Brussels on Tuesday to go ahead with negotiations with Ankara for full EU membership.
This is a breakthrough for both Turkey and Europe. Some European quarters have been hesitant to give Ankara the green light on membership for fear that a large Muslim nation such as Turkey would threaten European resources, as well as culture and civilization. But the greater majority of Europeans who viewed the Turkish membership differently and interpreted it as an asset for Europe prevailed and gave Turkey the nod that it has long been awaiting.
As British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw pointed out during the debate at the EU headquarters, Turkey is a valuable member of NATO and has defended European and Western interests for decades. Its efforts at economic reform would be strengthened and the political stability that accompanies economic strength can only contribute to the socio-economic health of the EU.
Mehmet Simsek, an emerging market economist with Merrill Lynch, told BBC News that, at first, “Turkey will be a net recipient (of EU aid),” but in another 15 years or so “Turkey will actually be a net contributor to the EU budget, on the basis of the fact that Turkey is currently growing three to four times the EU trend growth.”
There is no question that Ankara still has a long way to go before it attains EU membership with a target date in 2014. Turkey made great strides in meeting the EU conditions by amending its basic legislation on democracy and human rights. More importantly, Turkey made considerable progress in improving its human rights record on the ground.
By the year 2014, Turkey is expected to complete all that is needed in order to qualify as a full EU member. Such efforts warrant appreciation.
It is believed that a secular Muslim Turkey will contribute a great deal to the advancement of Europe’s socio-economic wealth and can be a key player in securing peace and stability in the Euro-Mediterranean region.
The EU has made a good decision.