Claiborne Pell, 90

I was sad to hear that Senator Pell died while I was on vacation. He was a literal "good guy" who gave an unknown 25-year old novice an interview for a project that eventually became my documentary feature film Who Shall Live and Who Shall Die? From John Mulligan's obituary in the Providence Journal:

He was a onetime Foreign Service officer whose lifelong goal, the chairmanship of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, became a disappointment once he attained it. But as a dogged generalist who was happy to till a legislative field for years be fore it bore fruit, Pell scored lasting achievements. Cases in point were his campaigns against drunk driving, and for federally subsidized railroads.

He was a man who had a national college scholarship -- the Pell grants -- and a local bridge -- the Pell Bridge spanning Jamestown and Newport -- named for him, plus honorary degrees and international decorations running to the dozens. But Pell never outgrew a devotion to his late father that went beyond the filial.

The gaunt son wore the stout father's belt -- wrapping it around his waist several times to keep it properly cinched -- and decked his Capitol office with such mementoes as the sepia-toned photo of Navy Secretary Franklin D. Rosevelt, New York Gov. Al Smith and New York Democratic Chairman Herbert C. Pell.

The only child of Herbert Claiborne and Matilda (Bigelow) Pell, Jr., Claiborne deBorda Pell was born on Nov. 22, 1918, into a family whose forbears included fighters on both sides of the American Revolution, five members of Congress and a vice president (George M. Dallas, who served under President James K. Polk from 1845 to 1849).

Pell's father represented Manhattan's silk stocking district in the House from 1918-20. As President, Roosevelt appointed him minister to Portugal and Hungary.

His father's work gave Pell a front-row seat on history and shaped his ambitions. They were on hand, for example, to hear London applaud Neville Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler. The future senator drew particular inspiration from Herbert Pell's little-noted efforts on behalf of Jews in flight from pre-war Nazi Germany. [EDITOR'S NOTE: Herbert Pell was instrumental in the establishment of both the Sosua colony for Jewish Refugees in the Dominican Republic, and a 1944 UN Resolution asking that crimes against stateless persons or any individuals because of their race or religion be included as a war crime, since such acts are against the "laws of humanity." (USHMM 1994, 33)]

The family summered often in Newport, moving there permanently when Claiborne was nine. He received his early education at St. George's School there and studied at Princeton during what he later called ``the last of the F. Scott Fitzgerald days.''

Young Pell ran cross country, played on a rugby team that won the Intercollegiate Championship and graduated cum laude in 1940. He later took a masters degree in fine arts at Columbia.

After graduation, Pell worked as a roustabout in the Oklahoma oil wells. Then he made his first sally into foreign affairs as a private secretary at the American Legation in Portugal. After the war broke out, Pell drove trucks in the effort to carry emergency supplies to prisoners of war in Germany. He was arrested several times by the Nazi government.

Four months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, Pell enlisted in the Coast Guard as a ship's cook. He saw duty in the North Atlantic and Mediterranean before he contracted undulant fever and was sent back to the Newport Naval Hospital. There he met his future wife, Nuala O'Donnell, a fellow Newporter whose great-grandfather had founded the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company.

Pell played bit parts in the opening scenes of the Cold War, watching the tanks of Soviet occupation roll into Czechoslovakia and clerking for the creators of the United Nations in San Francisco. As a senator, Pell could always produce a well-thumbed blue copy of the U.N. charter from his jacket pocket. Pell's tour in the Foreign Service included assignments to the consulate in Genoa, Italy and the State Department's Baltic Bureau.

In 1951, the Pells built a shingled ranch house, largely of Pell's design, overlooking Rhode Island Sound on Ledge Road, near Bailey's Beach in Newport. Pell spent much of the 1950s in investment banking but kept active in politics.

When he jumped into the free-for-all to succeed retiring Sen. Theodore F. Green in 1960, no less an authority than Democratic Presidential candidate John F. Kennedy called Pell the least electable man in America. Political Rhode Island tended to dismiss Pell's candicacy as a sideshow to the blood match between two hard Irish pols - former Governors Dennis J. Roberts and J. Howard McGrath - both past their prime and with a whiff of scandal about them.

The newcomer unleashed on them the first modern political campaign the state had seen, pouring his own money into television, polls and professional managers of the Democratic primary campaign. And Pell set rules for himself that became his hallmarks on and off the campaign trial:

Don't attack the other fellow. Keep a sense of humor. Do the unexpected.

When the opposition cried ``carpetbagger,'' Pell fired back with full-page newspaper ads featuring his grand-uncle Duncan Pell, Rhode Island lieutenant governor in 1865.

When one foe called him ``a creampuff,'' Pell trumpeted the endorsement of the bakers union.

When somebody sneered that little Claiborne had been raised by a nanny, Pell trotted out a very nice old lady who made a very nice impression on voters.

Pell's appeal may have been less mysterious than it appeared, based as it was on the simple tool with which Pell disarmed opponents for decades: a self-deprecating brand of honesty.

The late U.S. Sen. John H. Chafee, a failed Pell challenger who became his Senate colleague for two decades, once said, "It's very fundamental in politics to be what you are. 'To thine own self be true.' Claiborne has always been very straightforward in that regard.''

Fareed Zakaria on Samuel Huntington

From today's Washington Post:

Living through change, people have often stuck with their oldest and
most durable source of security: religion. That was the most important
message of "The Clash of Civilizations." While others were celebrating the
fall of communism and the rise of globalization, Huntington saw that with
ideology disappearing as a source of human identity, religion was returning
to the fore.

My own relationship with "The Clash of Civilizations" is complicated.
When I was a graduate student, I was asked by Huntington to comment on a
draft of the essay. A few months later, shortly after becoming managing
editor of Foreign Affairs, I helped publish it. I still think Huntington
got some important things wrong, but much in that essay is powerful and
prescient.

My relationship with Sam Huntington, however, was uncomplicated. I
admired him through and through. He was a pathbreaking scholar, a generous
teacher and a devoted friend. His work was remarkably broad. His first book
practically invented the field of civil-military relations; his last was on
demographics and culture. He was also broad-minded. While many academics of
his age and political persuasion -- temperamentally conservative -- were
seared by the campus chaos of the 1960s, Huntington saw the student
radicals as part of a recurring tradition of American puritans, righteously
enraged that American institutions didn't live up to the country's founding
principles. He closed one book by noting of such critics: They "say that
America is a lie because its reality falls so far short of its ideals. They
are wrong. America is not a lie; it is a disappointment. But it can be a
disappointment only because it is also a hope."

I learned from the books but also from the man. I never saw Sam
Huntington do anything deceitful or malicious, or sacrifice his principles
for power, access or expedience. He lived by the Anglo-Protestant
principles he cherished: hard work, honesty, fair play, courage, loyalty
and patriotism.

Fouad Ajami on Samuel Huntington

From the Wall Street Journal:

If I may be permitted a personal narrative: In 1993, I had written the lead critique in Foreign Affairs of his thesis ["The Clash of Civilizations"]. I admired his work but was unconvinced. My faith was invested in the order of states that the West itself built. The ways of the West had become the ways of the world, I argued, and the modernist consensus would hold in key Third-World countries like Egypt, India and Turkey. Fifteen years later, I was given a chance in the pages of The New York Times Book Review to acknowledge that I had erred and that Huntington had been correct all along.

A gracious letter came to me from Nancy Arkelyan Huntington, his wife of 51 years (her Armenian descent an irony lost on those who dubbed him a defender of nativism). He was in ill-health, suffering the aftermath of a small stroke. They were spending the winter at their summer house on Martha's Vineyard. She had read him my essay as he lay in bed. He was pleased with it: "He will be writing you himself shortly." Of course, he did not write, and knowing of his frail state I did not expect him to do so. He had been a source of great wisdom, an exemplar, and it had been an honor to write of him, and to know him in the regrettably small way I did.

We don't have his likes in the academy today. Political science, the field he devoted his working life to, has been in the main commandeered by a new generation. They are "rational choice" people who work with models and numbers and write arid, impenetrable jargon.

More importantly, nowadays in the academy and beyond, the patriotism that marked Samuel Huntington's life and work is derided, and the American Creed he upheld is thought to be the ideology of rubes and simpletons, the affliction of people clinging to old ways. The Davos men have perhaps won. No wonder the sorrow and the concern that ran through the work of Huntington's final years.

Martin Kramer on the Gaza Crisis

From Martin Kramer's Sandbox:

In the fog of war, it isn't just the truth that falls casualty. So does common sense. Quite a few pundits seem to think that Israel lacks a strategy in Gaza. But unlike the Lebanon war of 2006, this war has been planned in advance, and every stage has been war-gamed. Here is my read of Israel's strategic plan, which lies behind "Operation Cast Lead."

Israel's long-term strategic goal is the elimination of Hamas control of Gaza. This is especially the goal of the Kadima and Labor parties, which are distinguished by their commitment to a negotiated final status agreement with the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas. The Hamas takeover in Gaza reduced Abbas to a provincial governor, who no longer represents effective authority in all the areas destined for a future Palestinian state. Hamas rule in Gaza is a bone in the throat of the "peace process"—one Israel is determined to remove.

Struggle over Sanctions. But how? After the Hamas takeover in June 2007, Israel imposed a regime of economic sanctions on Gaza, by constricting the flow of goods and materials into Gaza via its crossings to Israel. The idea was gradually to undermine the popularity of Hamas in Gaza, while at the same time bolstering Abbas. Israel enjoyed considerable success in this approach. While the diplomatic "peace process" with Abbas didn't move very far, the West Bank enjoyed an economic boomlet, as Israel removed checkpoints and facilitated the movement of capital, goods, workers, and foreign tourists. So while Gaza languished under sanctions, with zero growth, the West Bank visibly prospered—reinforcing the message that "Islamic resistance" is a dead end.

Hamas in power, from the outset, sought to break out of what it has called the Israeli "siege" by firing rockets into Israel. Its quid pro quo was an end to Hamas rocket fire in exchange for a lifting of the Israeli "siege." When Israel and Hamas reached an agreement for "calm" last June, Hamas hoped the sanctions would be lifted as well, and Israel did increase the flow through the crossing points, by about 50 percent. Fuel supplies were restored to previous levels. But Hamas was fully aware that sanctions were slowly eroding its base and contradicting its narrative that “resistance” pays. This is why it refused to renew the "calm" agreement after its six-month expiration, and renewed rocket fire.

Were Israel to lift the economic sanctions, it would transform Hamas control of Gaza into a permanent fact, solidify the division of the West Bank and Gaza, and undermine both Israel and Abbas by showing that violent "resistance" to Israel produces better results than peaceful compromise and cooperation. Rewarding "resistance" just produces more of it. So Israel's war aim is very straightforward, and it is not simply a total cease-fire. At the very least, it is a total cease-fire that also leaves the sanctions against Hamas in place. This would place Israel in an advantageous position to bring about the collapse of Hamas rule sometime in the future—its long-term objective.

David Israel on the Gaza Crisis

I received the following email from a member of the 6th Armored Division association, of which I am an honorary member:

Got so many questions like the one below I decided to write up a kind of common answer.....so for whatever it's worth my answer.
dave


What's Your Take


I live in a retirement community in Medford, Oregon. There are almost 1000 residents here between the ages of 65 and 100 years of age. The political makeup is approximately 275 Democrats, 100 Independents and 675 Republicans, although In the recent election there was a sizable number of crossover votes.

Within the past week I have been greeted by many fellow residents with, “So what's your take on Gaza?” (Many residents are aware that I lived in Israel for eight years which included the period of the 1973 war, “ The Yom Kippur War”). Before answering I usually counter with, “What's your take?”. (The last sentence of this piece will state the most common answers received to this question). Since Southern Oregon is Bible Belt country the answer is not the usual media reaction that appeasement and capitulation must be the Israeli policy. While it is true that some former members of the Academic community who consider themselves to be legal experts accuse Israel of gross violations of international law and demand an immediate cease fire, others see things differently. One woman asked when would Israel end their terrible occupation of Gaza. “Where did you hear that Gaza was occupied”, I asked. “I heard it on talk radio”, she answered. She was totally unaware that Israel had left Gaza in 2005, leaving all industry and infrastructure to the Gazan population. The Gazans then immediately destroyed everything. Ten thousand Israelis were uprooted and forced to move out of the Gaza strip. Unfortunately there is a lot of misinformation spread by media people who do not have the knowledge or the background but who pose as experts on the Middle East.

Many opposed the Israeli evacuation of Gaza saying at the time it would just give terrorist organizations a closer base from which to bombard Israeli population centers. The politicians won out leading to what is being experienced today, exactly as predicted. It did take three years, but now the cities of Ashdod, Ashkelon and Arad are targeted by Hamas missiles on a daily basis. Sixty three hundred rockets and mortar shells have fallen on Israel since 2005. Five months ago President -elect Obama visited the city of Sderot in southern Israel. His reaction: “If somebody was sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I would do everything to stop that and would expect Israel to do the same thing.”

Who then bears the responsibility for what is happening in Gaza today? Israel does not want the territory. Israel had it and gave it to the people of the area. Egypt does not want Gaza or the Gazan people. The fact is that Egyptian borders are closed to the people of Gaza. When Egypt controlled the area the people were denied Egyptian citizenship. What would be the immediate effect if Hamas stopped firing missiles and mortars into Israel? Would there be quiet as there was during the six month cease fire which recently ended? Would the oil rich Arab countries offer aid to their brothers in Gaza? Would Egypt allow Gazans free passage into Egypt? Would any of the 22 existing Arab countries allow Gazans to emigrate? These situations have never taken place, although they may in the future. Maybe. Meanwhile there are one and a half million people in Gaza and the casualties mount daily. Terrorist groups numbering approximately 25,000 bring death and destruction on the entire population. Hamas warns the terrorists to dress in civilian clothes so that it would not be possible to distinguish them from the general population. Casualty figures are difficult to determine but both the UN and Palestinian Authorities claim that 60 civilians have thus far been killed. Israeli intelligence had pinpointed only military targets, but since Hamas places these facilities in populated areas civilian deaths are inevitable. There seems little doubt there will be many more civilian deaths, although up to now most of those killed were terrorists (according to Hamas' own figures).

The United Nations expressed serious concern at the escalation of the situation in Gaza and called for an immediate halt to all violence. The members called on the parties to stop immediately all military activities. It should be noted that no such calls for calm were issued by the United Nations while missiles and mortar shells were falling indiscriminately only on Israel. According to international humanitarian law there exists a principle of “distinction” when it comes to combat. Legitimate targets may be only enemy combatants or objects that contribute to enemy military activity. Furthermore there is a prohibition on the use of weapons that cannot be aimed at specific targets, thus violating the principle of distinction. Under these rulings every one of the 6300 rockets fired into Israel since 2005 is a war crime .Firing weapons aimed into civilian areas qualifies under both counts as war crimes. The UN has never called attention to these war crimes while calling for calm at this time.To some it would seem that Israel has exercised overwhelming restraint before responding to Hamas provocations.

British Prime Minister Gordeon Brown December 27: “I call on Gazan militants to cease all attacks on Israel immediately. These attacks are designed to cause random destruction and to undermine the prospects of Peace talks led by President Abas. I understand the Israeli government's sense of obligation to its population.”

The most common answer to the query ...What's your take?.......”Its about time.” david l. israel

Happy New Year!

All good wishes for 2009, to all our readers...

Merry Christmas!

Here's Barack Obama's Christmas Message:

Remarks of President-Elect Barack Obama
Holiday Radio Address
December 27, 2008

Good morning. This week, Americans are gathering with family and friends across the country to celebrate the blessings of Christmas and the holiday season.

As we celebrate this joyous time of year, our thoughts turn to the brave men and women who serve our country far from home. Their extraordinary and selfless sacrifice is an inspiration to us all, and part of the unbroken line of heroism that has made our freedom and prosperity possible for over two centuries.

Many troops are serving their second, third, or fourth tour of duty. And we are reminded that they are more than dedicated Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guard – they are devoted fathers and mothers; husbands and wives; sons and daughters; and sisters and brothers.

This holiday season, their families celebrate with a joy that is muted knowing that a loved one is absent, and sometimes in danger. In towns and cities across America, there is an empty seat at the dinner table; in distant bases and on ships at sea, our servicemen and women can only wonder at the look on their child’s face as they open a gift back home.

Our troops and military families have won the respect and gratitude of their broader American family. Michelle and I have them in our prayers this Christmas, and we must all continue to offer them our full support in the weeks and months to come. .

These are also tough times for many Americans struggling in our sluggish economy. As we count the higher blessings of faith and family, we know that millions of Americans don’t have a job. Many more are struggling to pay the bills or stay in their homes. From students to seniors, the future seems uncertain.

That is why this season of giving should also be a time to renew a sense of common purpose and shared citizenship. Now, more than ever, we must rededicate ourselves to the notion that we share a common destiny as Americans – that I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper. Now, we must all do our part to serve one another; to seek new ideas and new innovation; and to start a new chapter for our great country.

That is the spirit that will guide my Administration in the New Year. If the American people come together and put their shoulder to the wheel of history, then I know that we can put our people back to work and point our country in a new direction. That is how we will see ourselves through this time of crisis, and reach the promise of a brighter day.

After all, that is what Americans have always done.

232 years ago, when America was newly born as a nation, George Washington and his Army faced impossible odds as they struggled to free themselves from the grip of an empire.

It was Christmas Day—December 25th, 1776 – that they fought through ice and cold to make an improbable crossing of the Delaware River. They caught the enemy off guard, won victories in Trenton and Princeton, and gave new momentum to a beleaguered Army and new hope to the cause of Independence.

Many ages have passed since that first American Christmas. We have crossed many rivers as a people. But the lessons that have carried us through are the same lessons that we celebrate every Christmas season—the same lessons that guide us to this very day: that hope endures, and that a new birth of peace is always possible.

Happy Hannukah!

No shoe-throwing at President Bush's Hannukah reception this year, I'm sure, even though he held it a little early--December 15th, at the White House. The pictures look nice.

He said some nice things, too:

The story of Hanukkah recalls the miraculous victory of a small band of patriots against tyranny, and the oil that burned for eight nights. Through centuries of exile and persecution, Jews have lit the menorah. Each year, they behold its glow with faith in the power of God, and love for His greatest gift -- freedom.

This Hanukkah we celebrate another miraculous victory -- the 60th anniversary of the founding of the state of Israel. When President Harry Truman led the world in recognizing Israel in May of 1948, many wondered whether the small nation could possibly survive. Yet from the first days of independence, the people of Israel defied dire predictions. With determination and hard work, they turned a rocky desert into fertile soil. They built a thriving democracy, a strong economy, and one of the mightiest military forces on earth. Like the Maccabees, Israel has defended itself bravely against enemies seeking its destruction. And today, Israel is a light unto the nations -- and one of America's closest friends.

This evening, we have the great privilege of celebrating Israel's 60th anniversary and Hanukkah in a very special way. Thanks to the generosity of the Truman Library, we are fortunate to light the menorah presented to President Truman in 1951 as a symbol of friendship by Israel's first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion.

A decade after President Truman received this gift, he visited Prime Minister Ben-Gurion for one of the last times. As they parted, Ben-Gurion told the President that as a foreigner he could not judge President Truman's place in American history, but the President's courageous decision to recognize the new state of Israel gave him an immortal place in Jewish history. Those words filled the President's eyes with uncharacteristic tears. And later, Ben-Gurion would say he rarely had seen somebody so moved.

And so tonight I'm deeply moved to welcome the grandsons of these two great men -- Clifton Truman Daniel and Yariv Ben-Eliezer -- to light the Truman menorah together.

Laura and I wish all the people of Jewish faith a happy Hanukkah and many joyous Hanukkahs in the years ahead. Thank you. (Applause.)

More International Problems From Clinton Donor List

The mainstream American media may be turning a blind eye to the smoking guns in the Clinton donor list--but they are paying attention in Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon). Here's a report from the Sunday Leader about problems at The Stassen Group:

Stassen Group cited in list of donors to Bill Clinton

The Stassen Group of Companies headed by tycoon Harry Jayawardene has donated between US$ 100,000 to 250,000 to the William J. Clinton Foundation, it is revealed.

Former US President Clinton last week released a list of donors to his charity, The William J. Clinton Foundation following an assurance given he would do so on the nomination of his wife Senator Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State designate in President Elect Barack Obama's new Administration.

The 'Stassen Group' is named in the list of donors having contributed between US$ 100,001 to US$ 250,000.

Jayawardene is currently embroiled in a legal battle with fellow directors of the Stassen Group which is expected to turn nasty.

It is learned,Clintons detractors will trace the source of all monies received by the Foundation including whether they have come through the proper financial channels of the respective countries.

Who's Lying About Clinton Donor List?

Indian mogul Amar Singh or Bill Clinton? According to Indian website Livemint.com, somebody is not telling the truth:

New Delhi: Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh on Friday denied contributing any money to the William Jefferson Clinton Foundation, which has listed him as one of the top donors on Thursday.

“I am denying it,” he told Mint in an interview. “I cannot react to media speculations. Anything can be written about anybody and I do not think I should react to it.”

“Let me add that I feel privileged to be on the list of friends (former US president Bill and wife Hillary) Clintons have,” Singh added. “It is a matter of happiness that I am friends with the Clintons.”

As part of a deal that cleared the way for Hillary Clinton to be nominated by US President-elect Barack Obama as the next secretary of state, Bill Clinton released a list of 205,000 donors on the foundation’s website. A list of top donors, those who gave $100,000 (about Rs47 lakh today) or more, reported by The Wall Street Journal shows Singh as having given between $1 million and $5 million."

This story has already caused controversy in India, according to the Economic Times of India:

Impressive, indeed! But also as intriguing, as Mr Singh's total declared assets, as per the affidavit filed along with his nomination papers for election to the Rajya Sabha, are no more than Rs 37 crore. So, did the SP leader bring alive the Mahabharata hero Daanveer Karna when he decided to donate up to more than two-thirds of his wealth to the Clinton Foundation?

Imagine, if this is how Hillary Clinton begins a term as Secretary of State...how do you think it would end?

Washington Post: Clinton List Means "Heap of Potential Trouble"

The paper pulls its punches by suggesting that there is a way out for the Clintons with a revised agreement with Obama--but in fact the logic of the case dictates that there isn't any possible agreement that a convicted perjurer and impeached former President may reasonably be trusted to follow. The Clinton list should signal the end of Hillary's bid for Secretary of State. If not, Obama's promise to change the culture of Washington should prove D.O.A. on January 20th, 2009. A self-inflicted wound that would haunt his entire administration.

From Sunday's Washington Post editorial:

But however worthy the cause or uncontroversial the foreign government, it strikes us that such fundraising by the former president presents an unavoidable conflict. What is the standard for the ethics official to apply? Doesn't spurning a proffered donation from a foreign government risk creating its own diplomatic problems? What happens when Secretary Clinton, visiting Country X to press for, say, a climate change agreement, is informed by the prime minister that he's just written her husband a $10 million check for that cause? What about gifts from foreign governments seeking trade concessions or approval to purchase military equipment? Even if Ms. Clinton is not influenced by gifts to her husband's charity, the appearance of a conflict is unavoidable. The better approach would be to allow existing commitments to go forward but to forswear any new ones.

Moreover, the memorandum of understanding does not appear to contemplate any prior review of contributions by foreign individuals or corporations, or by U.S. companies or individuals with overseas entanglements. So consider -- because it already happened -- the case of a wealthy investor who is seeking business opportunities in, say, Kazakhstan. He gives millions to the Clinton foundation, visits the country with the former president and obtains the sought-after contract. No one in the Obama administration will vet such a gift in advance; the public will learn of it only with the yearly disclosure. The new administration is buying itself a heap of potential trouble with this arrangement.

Wall Street Journal: More Dirt From Clinton Foundation List

This sort of story would compromise Hillary from the get-go, were she to be confirmed as Secretary of State. From today's Wall Street Journal:

The Nigerian-born Mr. [Gilbert] Chagoury, whose family is Lebanese, has also been a financial supporter of Christian politicians and religious leaders in Lebanon, another potential diplomatic hot spot, say people familiar with that nation's political scene.

Mr. Chagoury and representatives for Mr. Clinton have repeatedly declined to comment on the two men's relationship. Following Thursday's disclosures by the Clinton Foundation, a spokesman for President-elect Barack Obama said Mr. Obama wouldn't be commenting on any of the donors.

Mr. Chagoury's ties to Mr. Clinton apparently began in the mid-1990s. The Clinton administration was being urged by human rights-activists and others to put severe sanctions on Nigeria because of the Abacha regime's practice of jailing and executing political opponents.

In August 1996, President Clinton dispatched then-Rep. Bill Richardson to Nigeria to lay out the U.S. government's concerns. In an interview earlier this year, Mr. Richardson, currently New Mexico's governor and President-elect Obama's nominee for commerce secretary, said that after a meeting with the dictator, he was taken to see Mr. Chagoury, who supposedly "had a lot of influence with Abacha." During an hour-and-a-half discussion over pizza at Mr. Chagoury's home, the businessman seemed sympathetic to U.S. complaints but noncommittal, Mr. Richardson said.

A few weeks later, prior to the 1996 U.S. presidential election, Mr. Chagoury contributed $460,000 to a tax-exempt voter-registration group connected to the Democratic National Committee. A 1997 Washington Post article said that Mr. Chagoury subsequently received an invitation to a White House dinner for Democratic Party supporters. He also met with Clinton administration officials on Nigeria and later talked privately about his efforts to influence U.S. policy toward that country, says a person familiar with the matter.

Over the years, business deals Mr. Chagoury has been involved with have been the subject of government investigations into suspected bribery by Western companies that do business in Nigeria, according to news reports. In 2004, Mr. Chagoury was among those whom Nigerian investigators sought to question about a gas-terminal deal, according to news reports. He hasn't been accused of wrongdoing in any of the investigations.

Despite any controversies, Mr. Chagoury has steadily built ties to Mr. Clinton. In 2003, he helped organize a Caribbean trip where the former president was paid $100,000 for a speech. Mr. Clinton has made over $40 million giving speeches around the world. According to news reports, Mr. Chagoury attended Mr. Clinton's 60th birthday bash two years ago in New York. He also joined the former president at the gala wedding celebration in France last year of Mr. Clinton's top aide, Douglas Band, say people who were there.

During the just-completed election campaign, a Chagoury relative, Michel Chaghouri of Los Angeles, was listed in campaign records as someone who raised at least $100,000 for Mrs. Clinton's presidential campaign. Campaign records also show that Mr. Chaghouri raised money from a number of individuals named "Chagoury" or "Chaghouri" or "Chamchoum" -- Chamchoum is the maiden name of Gilbert Chagoury's wife. Several gave the federally allowed maximum of $4,600 each. Mr. Chagoury's name doesn't appear as a donor. As an apparent foreign national, Mr. Chagoury would generally be barred from giving to a U.S. presidential campaign.

Georgetown Journalism Students Sue CIA, FBI Over Daniel Pearl Death Documents

So much news that I almost forgot to post this item from yesterday's Washington Post about another FOIA case against the CIA --and FBI, among eight government agencies named-- to access documents relating to the death of Daniel Pearl in Pakistan. Inquiring minds want to know: Why isn't the Wall Street Journal also on this case? I'm not holding my breath for Mssrs. Gigot, McGurn and Taranto... Anyway, here's an excerpt from the Post:

For more than a year, a group of Georgetown University students has been poring over documents, searching for cellphone numbers of suspected terrorists and calling Pakistani police in the middle of the night. Now their class project has come to this: They're suing the CIA and the FBI.

The students' assignment was to find out who killed Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl and why. Although the class ended last spring and many of the students graduated, they're still trying to write that last paper.

Pearl disappeared while reporting in Pakistan in 2002. A video delivered to the FBI showed him being beheaded.

Yesterday, the group, known as the Pearl Project and now attached to the nonprofit Center for Public Integrity, filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court asking for the release of records by the CIA, FBI, Defense Department and five other federal agencies.

Members of the group are seeking, among other things, FBI files on convicted terrorist Richard Reid. Pearl was reporting a story about Reid and his Pakistani handler when he disappeared. They hope the lawsuit will unearth documents or new sources in time for them to finish their final paper late this spring.

"It's not only a really personal story . . . but a story really pertinent to current events and, well, to humanity," said Rebecca Tapscott, a 2008 graduate.

The idea for the class began in summer 2002, after four men were convicted in Pakistan in connection with Pearl's death. Pearl's longtime friend, Asra Nomani, with whom Pearl was staying when he disappeared, suspected that more people were involved. She knew, for example, that a man who led police to Pearl's body, which was found outside Karachi, was allegedly one of the guards who had held him. But he was never charged.

Nomani, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, and Barbara Feinman Todd, an associate dean at Georgetown, created a journalism seminar in 2007 to investigate Pearl's death and write the story that he was reporting when he was kidnapped. They also wanted to learn more about terrorist cells, counterterrorism efforts and the complicated relationship between the United States and Pakistan.

More on the Pearl Project can be found at the Center for Public Integrity website.

FOIABlog comments on the case:

This Washington Post article discusses a FOIA lawsuit filed this week by students in a Georgetown University journalism class. The suit is related to records various government agencies have about those involved in the death of Danny Pearl, including shoe bomber, Richard Reid, who Pearl was trying to interview before his kidnapping.

I believe Richard Reid, and others like him, have very limited privacy rights. They are not U.S. Citizens or Legal Permanent Residents, thus they have no rights under the Privacy Act. There is a huge public interest in these records and as such, agencies should not send out letters asking for these people's signatures before they will process records relating to them. This is not a new issue as years ago, the DEA turned down a request by Terry Anderson for information on those who kept him hostage--and didn't relent until Anderson was forced to sue. Hopefully, the new administration will find compentent people to oversee FOIA Offices at these agencies so that the courts are not clogged with these types of matters.

Wonkette on Clinton Foundation Donor List

THE SAUDIS OWN EVERYTHING: Clinton Foundation’s List Of Foreign Influence-Buyers Is Quite Long And Sinister

Approximately 1400 million years ago in the Paleozoic era, when Hillary Clinton was running for President instead of Secretary of State, she was asked repeatedly if the Clinton Foundation would release its donor list. She always said, “Well, you’ll have to talk to my husband about that,” which was liberal doublespeak for “Fuck no.” Now after repeated threats from the Chicago mobster Barack Obama, the Foundation has released its donor list, which is over TWO THOUSAND NINE HUNDRED PAGES LONG. (Maybe that is why the Web page takes so frigging long to load?) Let’s see how many foreign governments were extorted by Bill Clinton to buy him blow jobs on Ron Burkle’s jet!

Holy zowie wow!

Saudi Arabia … the Cheneyite breakaway republic of Blackwater … also the notorious rogue nations of Norway, Italy, and Jamaica … plus the Dutch national lottery. This explains why Bill Clinton is always talking, in Dutch, about how a lottery “isn’t really gambling.”

Madoff Bad for Jewish Charities and Investors, Not Bad for the Jews...

The Jewish Telegraphic Agency published a roundup of losses reported so far in the Bernard Madoff scandal...including an interesting graphic showing charity victims. But IMHO, while this may be bad for Madoff's investors, it is not so bad for the Jews. Madoff showed that Jews are just like everybody else--not at all stereotypical "Yids" who cheat "Goyim," instead as rather trusting and gullible American investors who could fall for a con man as easily as anyone...

Paul Weyrich, 66

The Washington Post ran an interesting and surprisingly respectful obituary of Paul Weyrich on the front page this morning. He certainly deserved the coverage. Weyrich was a real Washington "character," like someone out of a fifties Otto Preminger film, the first actually pear-shaped person I'd ever met. He was an obvious train buff, and for a while had his own television network, on which I appeared a couple of times on TV shows hosted by him and Newt Gingrich to talk about the National Endowment for the Arts. This controversy was important enough to him to have been mentioned in his Post obituary:

"Look at the National Endowment for the Arts as a prototype," he told the Los Angeles Times. "Here's a piddling little organization -- about $100 million budget out of a $2 trillion budget -- and rather inconsequential in national significance. Republicans surely could have been able to shut that down given the fact that it had offended many, many people with the kind of art it had subsidized.

"But the culture overwhelmed the political process," he added. "Why? Because upper-crust, suburban Republican women in the districts of Republican congressmen defended the filth."

Actually, he was pretty successful by Washington standards. Congress voted to zero out the NEA...and even George Bush hasn't dared try to restore NEA appropriations to the high levels of the 1990s. That's thanks to Weyrich, I'm sure.

His TV network began on satellite, then some cable channels--until Republicans drove him out of business due to his on-air criticism of them. He kept going, regardless. Weyrich had an old-fashioned stick-to-his guns quality, and an obvious eccentricity, that was unusual in button-down, carefully worded, and too-often cowardly Washington, DC. As the obits mentioned, he was one of the founders of the Heritage Foundation and the Moral Majority. He set up the Free Congress Foundation as his own bailiwick. More recently, he helped nurture Jihad Watch, where Robert Spencer has posted a tribute:

Paul Weyrich's impact on the national stage is well known. In 2007 when I was doing research on the so-called "Christianists" for my book Religion of Peace?, I found paranoid Leftist writers referring to him as the "most powerful man in America." He wasn't, but his influence in advancing the wisdom of protecting individual freedom and limited government in an age of encroaching statism and collectivism cannot be calculated.

Paul Weyrich was also one of the first and foremost American public figures to see through the "Islam is a Religion of Peace" deception that spread through the nation from President Bush and others after 9/11. In 2002 he named me an Adjunct Fellow of the Free Congress Foundation and asked me to write a series of monographs on Islam: An Introduction to the Qur'an; Women and Islam; An Islamic Primer; Islam and the West; The Islamic Disinformation Lobby; Islam vs. Christianity; and Jihad in Context. The perspective I expounded in them was just as unpopular with the conservative (and of course liberal) mainstream then as it is now, but Paul was undeterred by that; he was determined to defend the West and present the truth. He even arranged for me to address the Council for National Policy in New York, where fantasies and deceptions arising from political correctness and realpolitik usually rule the day.

Paul Weyrich taught me a great deal, by word and by example -- about how to deal both personally and professionally with the slanders and smears that are a daily aspect of this work (although I've not always lived up to his example in this); about how to avoid discouragement and keep on fighting no matter what the odds are, and about much more. He was an extraordinarily kind and genial man, a stark contrast in person to the vicious caricatures of him purveyed by those who feared and hated him.

I think one reason the Post gave Weyrich good play was that he was what he was...he was also good copy. Washington will miss him.

Clinton Donor List Disqualifies Hillary for State Department Post

It's like putting a "For Sale" sign on the Secretary of State. The disclosed 2000-plus name Clinton Foundation donor list is one big appearance of conflict-of-interest...not to mention appearance of corruption, bribery, and influence-peddling. It is an invitation for prosecution, not a recommendation for disinterested public service.

Just one example, this item from Bloomberg News:

Dec. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Canadian investor Victor Dahdaleh, facing a U.S. federal probe of allegations that he helped Alcoa Inc. defraud a Bahrain government-controlled metals company, is among donors who gave as much as $5 million to former President Bill Clinton’s charitable foundation.

The U.S. Justice Department in March said it was investigating claims in a lawsuit by Aluminum Bahrain BSC, which said Dahdaleh acted as a middleman for bribes that helped Alcoa overcharge the Bahrain company by as much as $975 million for alumina, used in aluminum manufacturing.

Dahdaleh’s dispute with Bahrain -- home of the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet and an anti-terrorism ally -- shows how entanglements by Bill Clinton’s financial backers may pose headaches for Hillary Clinton as the New York senator seeks confirmation as President-elect Barack Obama’s secretary of state.

“It certainly creates a couple of extra hurdles for the Obama administration,” said Joel Rosenthal, president of New York’s Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.

Mark Helprin on Bush's Ghastly Legacy

From today's Wall Street Journal:

The administrations of George W. Bush have virtually assured such a displacement by catastrophically throwing the country off balance, both politically and financially, while breaking the nation's sword in an inconclusive seven-year struggle against a ragtag enemy in two small bankrupt states. Their one great accomplishment -- no subsequent attacks on American soil thus far -- has been offset by the stunningly incompetent prosecution of the war. It could be no other way, with war aims that inexplicably danced up and down the scale, from "ending tyranny in the world," to reforging in a matter of months (with 130,000 troops) the political culture of the Arabs, to establishing a democracy in Iraq, to only reducing violence, to merely holding on in our cantonments until we withdraw.

This confusion has come at the price of transforming the military into a light and hollow semi-gendarmerie focused on irregular warfare and ill-equipped to deter the development and resurgence of the conventional and strategic forces of China and Russia, while begging challenges from rivals or enemies no longer constrained by our former reserves of strength. For seven years we failed to devise effective policy or make intelligent arguments for policies that were worth pursuing. Thus we capriciously forfeited the domestic and international political equilibrium without which alliances break apart and wars are seldom won.

The pity is that the war could have been successful and this equilibrium sustained had we struck immediately, preserving the link with September 11th; had we disciplined our objective to forcing upon regimes that nurture terrorism the choice of routing it out with their ruthless secret services or suffering the destruction of the means to power for which they live; had we husbanded our forces in the highly developed military areas of northern Saudi Arabia after deposing Saddam Hussein, where as a fleet in being they would suffer no casualties and remain at the ready to reach Baghdad, Damascus, or Riyadh in three days; and had we taken strong and effective measures for our domestic protection while striving to stay within constitutional limits and eloquently explaining the necessity -- as has always been the case in war -- for sometimes exceeding them. Today's progressives apologize to the world for America's treatment of terrorists (not a single one of whom has been executed). Franklin Roosevelt, when faced with German saboteurs (who had caused not a single casualty), had them electrocuted and buried in numbered graves next to a sewage plant.

Austin Powers Shoe-Throwing Prefigured Iraqi Incident

(ht Joe Garofoli, sfgate.com)

Cheney Misses Meaning of Iraqi Shoe-Throwing

In an interview with Jonathan Karl of ABC News, the Vice President provided evidence that the Bush administration simply does not understand how to conduct public diplomacy:

KARL: What did you think when you saw that shoe flying at the President?

CHENEY: I thought the President handled it rather well. He had some good moves, the way he ducked and avoided the shoe. And then what was his response -- that it was a size 10. I guess he could see that as it went by. No, I think it was an incident where an Iraqi reporter threw shoes at the President -- I don’t attribute any special significance to it.

Here's a link to some recent significance in Latin America: Latin Leaders Joke About Bush Shoe Attack:

COSTA DO SAUIPE, Brazil (Reuters) - Latin American leaders meeting in Brazil this week couldn't resist poking fun at U.S. President George W. Bush over his recent shoe-throwing incident in Iraq.

"Please, nobody take off your shoes," Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva joked to reporters at the start of a news conference on Wednesday.

An Iraqi journalist had hurled his shoes at Bush at a news conference in Baghdad on Sunday, calling him a dog.