Although much of the coverage of Obama’s new White House team has focused on the fact that most of the appointees so far have considerable Hill experience.  As Ezra Klein noted yesterday, “This is not an administration that will lack the cell phone numbers of key congressional players.”

Klein goes on to note an outlier among the Hill vets:  Mona Sutphen, who was named one of two White House Deputy Chiefs of Staff:

Sutphen is a slightly odder case — she’s a former foreign service office who has been a manager at Sandy Berger’s consultancy and recently co-authored The Next American Century: How the U.S. Can Thrive as Other Powers Rise.

I’m actually rather excited about this appointment.  Suthpen is one of the smartest, most able thinkers on foreign policy out there, representing a new generation whose defining years were not the Cold War or 9/11, but rather the Clinton Administration (h/t Yglesias):

The Next American Century represents, in many ways, a distillation of the Obama worldview:  America as a central player but not necessarily the dominant one.  As I’ve noted elsewhere,

[A]n Obama administration is likely to pursue a foreign policy based on sound strategic principles and coherent tactics.  Realism [will] trump ideology, and principles [will] trump interests. Call it pragmatic idealism, if you must apply a label.

In addition, an Obama administration will repair America’s disastrously dysfunctional foreign policy apparatus:  providing the State Department with the resources it needs; streamlining foreign assistance; reestablishing a robust and proactive public diplomacy; and clarifying the overlapping roles of State, NSC, Defense, and Homeland Security.  It will emphasize both innovation and results, rewarding creativity and encouraging critical thinking.

As far as I know, there’s never been a former (or current) foreign service officer who has served as White House Deputy Chief of Staff.  And since Midwest already has violated my Sorkintorium, I’ll note that no major character on The West Wing focused on foreign policy — that’s just not the way it was done back then (or in the Bush White House for that matter).

Unfortunately, it also points to the sad reality of a foreign service career in this day and age — talented mid-level officers are far more likely to leave for greener pastures than stick around for twenty years trying to get an Ambassadorship.  Had Sutphen stayed at State, she would be, most likely, a Deputy Chief of Mission somewhere, on the cusp of finding out whether she had been accepted into the Senior Foreign Service.

To put it bluntly, which would you rather be at a similar point in your career:  DCM in the Kyrgyz Republic or Deputy Chief of Staff to the most exciting political figure in thirty years?

One other note:  Sutphen once served in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL), my old stomping grounds (we did not overlap).  Given the fact that, under both Clinton and Bush, DRL was viewed as a career-killer by many foreign service officers, I have to say I’m pretty happy to see someone’s career not whither and die because she cared/cares about human rights.

If, as expected, Gregory Craig is named White House Counsel, Obama will have two State Department veterans in key positions.  For all the talk about the Capitol Hill veterans dominating, it’s worthwhile to note that no previous administration had put foreign policy experts in key positions outside the NSC apparatus.

You can find Sutphen’s bio (h/t Ambinder) below the fold.

Read the rest of this entry »

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First shock:  Axl Rose finally got around to releasing “Chinese Democracy,” the new Guns-n-Roses album.  For those unaware of the saga, just know that it took something like twenty years and evry other member of the band quit in frustration over a decage ago — it was, until now, the most famous failed rock album since the Beach Boys’ “Pet Sounds.”

Second shock:  “Chinese Democracy,” the first single, is surprisingly not-half-bad.  Trust me — I hated GN’R.  This is tantamount to me saying I spend my evenings listening to “Tammy Faye Baker Sings PTL Club Favorites.”

Granted, the guitar solo on the bridge is so old-school awful that it sounds like the dude-that-replaced-Slash is consciously channeling David St. Hubbins, but other than that, there’s not much to complain about.  For me it sounded more like Blue Oyster Cült’s “Godzilla” or The Move’s “Brontosaurus”  than “Welcome to the Jungle” or any other GN’R late 80s metal cliché.

Third shock:  Axl doesn’t scream.  Not once. Well, sorta at the beginning, but it’s not part of the lyrics.

Fourth shock:  the song is about. . .wait for it. . .the future of democracy in China.  That’s right — Axl Rose is really, really pissed at the ChiComs.

Really.

Granted, the lyrics aren’t that sophisticated.  Okay, they’re lame.  He rhymes Falun Gong with, uh, now.

CHINESE DEMOCRACY
It don’t really matter
You’ll find out for yourself
No, it don’t really matter
I’m gonna leave this thing to somebody else

If they were missionaries
Real time visionaries
Sitting in a chinese stew
To view my disinfatuation

I know that I’m a classic case
Watch my disenchanted face
Blame it on the Falun Gong
They see the hand and you can’t hold on now

Cause it would take a lot more hate than you
To stop the fascination
Even with an iron fist
All they’ve got to rule the nation
But all I got is precious time

It don’t really matter
Guess I’ll keep it to myself
No, it don’t really matter
I guess you’ll leave this thing to somebody else

Cause it would take a lot more time than you
Have got for masturbation
Even with your iron fist
All they’ve got to rule the nation
But all I got is precious time
All they’ve got to rule the nation
But all I got is precious time

It don’t really matter
I guess you’ll find out for yourself
No, it don’t really matter
So you can hear it now from somebody else

You think you’ve got it all locked up inside
And if you beat ‘em enough they’ll die
It’s like a walk in a park from a cell
And now you’re keeping your own kind in hell
And if you’re Great Wall rocks blame your self
While they all reach out for you hand/help?
And we’re out of time…

But hey — who’da thunk Axl Rose could be political?  Now we know why he wasn’t invited to perform during the Olympics Opening Ceremony.

But dude — masturbation with an iron fist?   Ouch.  And ewwww.

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The Connect U.S. Fund has launched a new two-year initiative to help shape debate during the upcoming Presidential transition.  As part of this effort, they’ve asked leading thinkers and advocates to talk about what should be the top two or three foreign policy priorities for the next President.  They’ve also kindly allowed us to cross-post the responses here.

Today, we’ll hear from Elisa Massimino.  You can find the previous posts here.  Thanks again to Heather Hamilton and Eric Schwartz for making the cross-postings happen.

Tonight, many Americans will tune in to watch Senator McCain and Senator Obama face off in the final presidential debate before the 2008 election. With just twenty days left in the campaign, the candidates are relentlessly focused on highlighting their differences. But the fury of this final round of sparring should not drown out the sound of a particular silence: there is no debate going on between the candidates about whether the United States should continue to allow the torture of prisoners in U.S. custody. Last month, in the first debate between the two parties’ nominees, Senator Obama and Senator McCain agreed that the United States must end the use of torture, which has stained our national honor and undermined the ability of the United States to lead.

Restoring our nation’s commitment to the rule of law must be a top priority for the next president of the United States. What the next president says will be important in this effort. In the early primary debates, both nominees condemned torture rather than extol the supposed heroism of 24’s fictional Jack Bauer or call for a doubling of the size of Guantánamo, as some of their opponents did. Hearing more from the two candidates tonight about the particulars of how they plan to restore the rule of law would be instructive. But, because of the way the current administration has sought to distort, obscure and evade the clear language of the law, words alone — from the candidates now or from the new president in January — will not be enough. After all, President Bush has repeatedly asserted that “we do not torture,” meanwhile privately authorizing conduct like waterboarding that our own military has long considered to be war crimes. It will be the actions of the next administration that will either confirm Vice President Cheney’s assertion of a “new normal,” or will prove him wrong.

The next president should prioritize a return to the rule of law in two key areas: enforcing the prohibitions on torture and other cruelty; and abandoning the failed experiment at Guantánamo in favor of the proven effectiveness of our federal criminal justice system. Taking these steps will go a long way toward restoring the essential moral authority of the United States as a leader for human rights and will strengthen national security by contributing to a more effective counterterrorism strategy.

The next president will have a window of opportunity to signal to the American people and the rest of the world that the policies of the last seven years were an aberration and that the United States is serious about restoring the rule of law, upholding our Constitution and respecting the international rules our country played such a central role in formulating.

Here’s the 12-step program to get us back on the straight and narrow:

• Renounce torture and official cruelty, ideally in the inaugural address.
• Enforce existing bans on torture and cruel treatment.
• Repudiate and rescind all orders, memoranda and legal opinions authorizing cruel treatment or secret detention.
• Release publicly all documents authorizing cruel treatment, secret detention, or rendition.
• End secret prisons and the practice of holding “ghost prisoners.”
• Put a moratorium on extraordinary renditions and direct the National Security Advisor to undertake a 90-day review to assess the use of diplomatic assurances and issue new regulations to ensure we are not sending people to places where they are likely to be tortured.
• Announce the intention to empty the Guantánamo detention facility within one year.
• Suspend pending military commission proceedings and terminate Combatant Status Review Tribunals and Administrative Review Boards.
• Direct the Attorney General to review Guantánamo cases for federal court prosecution.
• Direct the Secretary of State to perform individualized risk assessments and review remaining cases for transfer to prosecution, repatriation, or resettlement.
• Direct the Attorney General to identify secure U.S. detention facilities capable of housing detainees identified for federal court prosecution.
• Establish a bipartisan commission to investigate U.S. government detention and interrogation operations, assess the strategic impact of these operations, identify lessons learned, and make recommendations to avoid future abuses.

The misguided embrace of indefinite detention, torture and deeply flawed military commissions has greatly damaged the reputation of the United States, fueled terrorist recruitment and undermined international cooperation in counterterrorism operations. Repairing our reputation as a nation committed to the rule of law will require bold action. That must start with finally closing the detention facility in Guantánamo and demonstrating — in deed, not just in word—an unequivocal commitment to treating all prisoners humanely.

Elisa Massimino is the Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director of Human Rights First (formerly the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights). Elisa is the organization’s chief advocacy strategist, an expert on a range of international human rights issues and a national authority on US compliance with human rights law. She testifies frequently before Congress, writes extensively for legal and popular publications, and serves as one of the organization’s primary spokespeople with the media. She is Human Rights First’s point of contact with U.S. government leaders, international diplomats, and human rights opinion leaders and decision makers.

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There’s word today from numerous sources that Colin Powell will go on Meet the Press this Sunday and endorse Barack Obama. The Obama campaign certainly isn’t doing anything to discourage the speculation:

Today Obama spokesperson Linda Douglas said she has no news on the Powell front, but the campaign would obviously love an endorsement.  ”We would welcome the support of somebody with such a distinguished and honorable career as General Powell,” she told me this morning, as Obama’s plane flew to Virginia for a rally.  Obama has previously cited Powell as a potential member of his administration, and the two have been in touch before. “I know they talk from time to time about foreign policy matters,” Douglas said, though she did not know the last time they spoke.  Powell is widely viewed as a thoughtful public servant who carries credibility (and experience) in both parties.

Quite a few folks in the progosphere think Powell endorsing Obama would be a great thing.  I’m not so sure.

Like many others, I had a great deal of respect for Powell before he joined the Bush Administration.  His story was a compelling one and his service was largely distinguished.  In 1996, Powell chose, for a variety of reasons, not to run for President.  Had he done so, he very well might have defeated Clinton.  Instead, he remained on the sidelines until Dubya asked him to serve as Secretary of State.

These days, Powell is often viewed as a tragic figure, largely because of his 2003 presentation at the UN Security Council during the Administration’s push for war with Iraq.  According to Powell, he was duped by the CIA, who convinced Powell that the intelligence behind his presentation was unimpeachable.  Powell then went out and made the case for war.

Thirty months later, Powell told Tim Russert that the CIA had misled him, using intelligence based on discredited sources.   Since then, conventional wisdom has given Powell the benefit of the doubt.  Many commentators regard his statement that he had been misled as the same thing as an apology:

Private warnings cannot cancel out Powell’s hawkish presentation to the U.N., but unlike so many war cheerleaders in politics and the media, he owned up to his mistakes. On national television, Powell called the U.N. address a “blot” on his record.

Fair enough — everyone makes mistakes, and to his credit, Powell has acknowledged (or at least gave the appearance of acknowledging) that he was wrong.  Second chances are the American way, and certainly a Powell endorsement of Obama would represent an open repudiation not only of his friend John McCain, but also of the Administration for whom he worked.

There’s just one small problem.  Powell’s testimony before the UNSC was only the second biggest “blot” on his record.

The biggest was, and is, his tacit support for torture.  If, as the Nuremberg tribunals established, knowledge is complicity, then Colin Powell is guilty of war crimes.  And unlike Iraq, he’s never apologized for his role in helping to shred the Constitution, ignore the Convention against Torture, and trash the Geneva Conventions.

Think I’m exaggerating?  Here’s what Jane Mayer has to say in The Dark Side:

Bush also knew about, and approved of, White House meetings in which his top cabinet members were briefed by the CIA on its plan to use specific “enhanced” interrogation techniques on various high-value detainees.  The meetings were chaired by Rice. . . . The participants were members of the Principals Committee, the five Bush cabinet members  who handled national security matters:  Vice President Cheney, Secretary of State Powell, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, CIA Director Tenet, and Attorney General Ashcroft.

Knowing how the Agency had been blamed for ostensible “rogue” actions in the past, Tenet was eager to spread the political risk of undertaking “enhanced interrogations.” However, some members of the group became irritated with Tenet’s insistence upon airing the grim details.  “The CIA already had legal clearance to do these things,” a knowledgable source said, “and so it was pointless for them to keep sharing the details.  No one was going to question their decisions. . . . It’s not as if any of the principals were debating the policy — that was already set.  They wanted to go to the limit that the law required. . . .”

There is no indication. . .that any Bush cabinet members objected to the policy. [emphasis added]

As Mayer acknowledges, Powell did object quite strongly to Bush’s decision to suspend the Geneva Conventions.  But he did not make those concerns public or threaten to resign.  He merely accepted the outcome and soldiered on.  It is only at the time of Abu Ghraib (and the first media reports of John Yoo’s infamous August 2002 “torture memo”), Mayer notes that Powell (along with Rice) began to express qualms:

After reading the torture memo  itself for the first time in the newspapers, Rice and Powell confronted Gonzales together and furiously insisted that there be “no more secret opinions on international and national security law.”  Their righteous anger seemed somewhat undercut by reports that Tenet had provided graphic details of specific coercive interrogations during the Principals Committee meetings while both were present.  And while they directed their frustration at Gonzales, neither had the temerity to confront Cheney, who clearly was the true source of these policies. [emphasis added]

Colin Powell passively assented to torture.  Although he occasionally raised concerns, there is no evidence that he threatened to resign — as Ashcroft and others did over the issue of domestic wiretapping.  He sat in meetings and listened as George Tenet offered graphic descriptions of torture committed by U.S. government officials — and never once objected, other than to complain that Tenet’s statements were unnecessary, given the fact that the President already had authorized torture.

As was the case with his presentation at the United Nations, he accepted what he heard and did as he was told.  Only later, after the Yoo memo and the Abu Ghraib scandal became public, did he begin to object — and then only to ask if there were any other memos he should know about.  At no time did he confront Cheney or Bush, threaten to go public, or quit in protest.

Later on, after he was once again a private citizen, Powell did raise concerns about the Administration’s policies, writing in 2006 to John McCain to express his opposition to proposed rules on Military Commissions:

In his letter to McCain, Powell said the effort to “redefine” the article was “inconsistent” with his previous opposition to the use of torture. “The world,” he wrote, “is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism.” . . .

Powell declined yesterday to address Bush’s comments. “To say that we want to modify, clarify or redefine Common Article 3 [of the Geneva Conventions], which has not been modified for the 57 years of its history, I think adds to the doubt” about U.S. morality, he said. “Plus I believe that the legitimate concerns that the administration has can be dealt with in other ways.”

The problem, of course, is that there is no public record during Powell’s tenure as Secretary of State of his “previous opposition to the use of torture.”  In his letter to McCain, Powell makes it clear that his objection is not with the underlying policy, but rather the tactics around the military commission.  That is not exactly taking a stand in the face of evil or speaking truth to power.

Silence in the face of evil is assent.  In the eyes of the law, it’s called conspiracy.   At best, Powell’s  actions — both in regard to Iraq and to torture — show a lack of critical thinking.  At worst, they demonstrate profound moral cowardice.

So pardon me if I’m not thrilled at the notion of Powell endorsing Barack Obama.

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Please watch, share, and blog about this amazing, wonderful short animated film.

I found this extraordinarily moving.  I’ve spent much of my career trying to convince governments to respect the rights contained in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and other documents.  Our own government could do a lot worse than adhering to the principles outlined therein.

When I was in the Clinton Administration, I conceived and got the President to sign an executive order creating the Eleanor Roosevelt Award, which honored Americans who had made outstanding contributions to the cause of human rights.  (For those who don’t know, Eleanor Roosevelt played a central role in the drafting of the UDHR.)  The award was established in December 1998, as part of the Administration’s commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration.   In the three years I helped put the event together, honorees included John Lewis, Fred Cuny, Bette Bao Lord, and Dorothy Thomas, among others.

It probably would not surprise you that the Bush Administration stopped giving it out.  It would be fitting for the next Administration to restart it.  The first awards should go to those who, over the past eight years, have fought so valiantly to try to keep this administration from shredding our rights and defacing the UDHR.

More importantly, we must demand that our government be the leader on human rights — the government as envisioned by Eleanor Roosevelt, Martin Luther King, Jr., Bobby Kennedy, and many others — and not among the world’s worst abusers.

We have that right.

You can find out more about the campaign here and the video here.

Hat tip:  Andrew Sullivan

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With all due respect to Martti Ahtisaari, who has played an outstanding role over the years in mediating conflicts, I cannot believe that he was the best choice for the Nobel Peace Prize, especially given the speculation that the Nobel Committee was considering giving it to Hu Jia and/or other Chinese activists.

Honoring another European bureaucrat-politician at a time when China’s human rights activists labor in anonymity, largely forgotten around the world (or worse, willfully ignored in order to appease the ChiComs) is both a travesty and a farce.

I once heard a story, perhaps apocryphal, that upon learning that he had been nominated for the Peace prize, Vaclav Havel urged the committee to consider instead a then-little-known human rights and democracy activist from the other side of the world.  The result was the awarding of the Prize in 1991 to Aung San Suu Kyi, an act that has helped maintain public awareness of and support for the cause of human rights and democracy in Burma.

It is a shame that Mr. Ahtisaari did not do the same when he was nominated.

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Ha!  Just when you thought there was no freaking way I could write another Olympics story, I mean with the economic crisis and election and other stuff, I, uh, do.

Remember those “protest zones” that China set up as part of its agreement with the International Sycophant Olympic Committee?  Well it turns out they’ve gone bye-bye.

The three parks in downtown Beijing designated as demonstration zones during the Beijing Olympics and Paralympics will cease function upon the ending of both Games, a senior official with the Games organizing committee said here on Wednesday.

“In future, relevant departments will continue to accept and handle demonstration applications in accordance with China’s law on assemblies, processions and demonstrations as well as the law’s implementation methods,” said Liu Shaowu, director of the security department under the Beijing Organizing Committee of the 29th Olympic Games (BOCOG).

The three parks, namely the Zizhuyuan Park, Ritan Park and World Park, were approved to serve as demonstration areas during the two Games in accordance with the requirement of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the common practice of other host cities of major international events, said Liu.

“During the Games, relevant departments received a number of demonstration applications from home and abroad. Except for very few cases that were not allowed by Chinese laws, all applications aimed at the settlement of some specific problems and issues,” said the official.

Through consultations between relevant authorities and the applicants, all the problems and issues were handled and settled properly, and the applicants withdrew their applications voluntarily, he added.

The final score, in case you were wondering is zero protests in the protest zones.  And not a peep from the IOC.

Believe it or not, that’s not the worst of it.  The ChiComs learned so much during the games:

[Liu] revealed that the Beijing 2008 Games have applied many high-tech security systems and facilities, such as the venue security control system, electronic ticket and card verification system, communications guarantee system, monitoring system, counterterror and riot-prevention system, and the security screening facilities.

And the planning, design, installation and application of these first-class systems and facilities have kept pace with the design and construction of all Games venues, to avoid incompatibility and ineffectiveness, he noted.

Avoiding incompatibility and ineffectiveness helps avoid other problems — like pesky protesters, free speech, and religious freedom.  You can bet that those cameras and other “high-tech security systems” will now be used to control dissent.

Can’t wait for Sochi 2014.  Gonna be a laugh riot, I’m sure.

Hat tip:  China Digital Times

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Oh jeez.  To paraphrase Michael Corleone, every time I try to get away from the Olympics, I get sucked back in.

I don’t know what’s up with the usually reliable Passport blog over at Foreign Policy magazine, but all of a sudden they seem to have lost their bearings.  First came Blake Hounshell’s argument that Michelle Obama should have thanked the Condi for being “assertive” over the past seven years, and now we have this gem from Patrick Fitzgerald:

We’re still a year away from learning who will host the 2016 Summer Olympics. But, while Beijing is fresh in our minds, I thought it’d be high time to consider the lessons and legacies of the 2008 games with an eye on the future.

If we learned one thing from Beijing 2008, it’s that the Olympics are a perfect pretext for a massive security crackdown. So why not award the 2016 games to a city that could actually use a massive security crackdown?

The murder rate in the state of Rio de Janiero is down to 39 per 100,000, from a high of 64 per 100,000 people in the mid-1990s. That’s still high, and one still encounters machine guns while browsing shopping stalls. Some think meditation may do the trick, but an Olympic effort to crack down on petty crime (not political opposition, mind you) could do wonders.

Now here’s what Human Rights Watch said last year about the Police in Rio — make sure you note what it says in the last graph:

According to government figures quoted in press reports, 44 people were killed during a two-month police operation aimed at dismantling drug trafficking gangs in Complexo do Alemão, Rio de Janeiro’s poorest neighborhood. Violence reached a peak on Wednesday, when 19 people were killed during confrontations with the police. According to allegations widely reported in the Brazilian media, the police carried out many of the killings through summary executions.

“A thorough investigation of these killings is absolutely critical for establishing the truth and improving public confidence in local law enforcement,” said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch. “The state must ensure independent inquiries that will lead to successful prosecutions, no matter who the perpetrators are.”

According to the state’s Secretary of Security, José Mariano Beltrame, all of the deaths occurred in confrontations with the police. However, in media reports, residents said that police killed and wounded unarmed bystanders. Three teenagers, ages 13, 14 and 16, were identified among the dead yesterday. Residents also claimed that police had killed a 10-year-old boy.

Last year, 1,603 people were killed in alleged confrontations with police in the state of Rio, according to the Institute of Public Security (ISP), the official statistics bureau for public security information. In the first four months of 2007, their bureau registered some 449 deaths, an increase of 36.5 percent in relation to the same period last year.

The operation in the Complexo do Alemão occur[ed] just two weeks before the beginning of the Pan-American Games in the city.

Like Fitzgerald, I think there are plenty of compelling reasons to give the games to Rio.  As he notes, a South American city has never hosted the Games, and it’s about damn time that someone do so.  But let’s not openly encourage a police department that operates like a death squad to undertake a “massive security crackdown,” because last time they did it in advance of a major sporting event, forty-four people died.

And let’s not give Brazil ideas about imitating China.  Brazil is now a stable democracy (albeit, as the HRW report shows, one with significant problems), but it is not that far removed from a series of dictatorships that trampled human rights and silenced dissent.

I don’t know who’s running things over at Passport, but this is now two really ignorant posts in two days.

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We’re taking one last look back at the most discussed — and controversial — Olympics since Berlin 1936. Previously, we looked at the winners.  Now let’s take a look at the losers.

1.  Human rights — the Chinese did everything they could to stifle dissent, and with the exception of a few brave Chinese and Westerners, they succeeded — so much so that they even managed to prevent any protests in the officially managed protest zones.  In the process, they also silenced and/or arrested hundreds if not thousands of dissidents; shipped tens of thousands of migrants and homeless out of Beijing; and perhaps most depressingly, created new electronic surveillance systems that give them the ability to shut down dissent before it starts.

2. Western media — with a few exceptions, the Western media mindlessly bought what the Chinese were selling.  And there was no bigger culprit than NBC, whose commentators (with the notable exception of Bob Costas) often sounded like apologists.  Worst of the worst:  Joshua Cooper-Ramo at the opening and closing ceremonies and Mary Carillo’s insipid travelogues.

3.  Chinese athletes — for all their victories, Chinese athletes didn’t look like they were having much fun.  The pressure to win was so great that it seemed to suck all the joy out of their participation.  There were exceptions, of course, but all too often we saw images of Chinese athletes looking like their lives had ended after failing to win gold.  Best example of this:  Chinese diver Zhou Luxin, who lost to Australian Matthew Mitcham on the last dive of the 10m platform competition.

4.  International Olympic Committee — for seven years, we’ve heard how the Olympics were going to open up China.  When it became clear that wasn’t the case, the IOC fell back on the old trope of the Olympics being above politics.  And when that didn’t work, they tried to change the subject.  From his blather before the games that he couldn’t talk about human rights to his criticism of Usain Bolt to his complicity in the cover-up of the Chinese gymnastic team age scandal, Jacques Rogge looked even worse.

5.  George W. Bush — while Russia invaded Georgia, he was playing hide the volleyball with Misty May-Traenor and Kerri Walsh.  Given his subsequent rhetoric about the conflict, he sure took his sweet time getting back to the States.

Next up:  winners who lost.

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So far we’ve seen dozens of speakers at the Democratic National Convention.  They’ve attacked Bush and McCain.  They’ve touted solutions to energy and climate change.  They’ve talked about Supreme Court justices and choice.  They’ve talked getting out of Iraq, and winning the war against the resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan.  A few have even mentioned, in passing, that the United States needs to rebuild its relationship with allies, once agan leading rather than dictating to the rest of the world.

But there is one set of issues that we haven’t heard about yet — not once in two days of banal blathering.

Call it the destruction of American values.  It includes a number of things.

Like torture.

Guantanamo.

Abu Ghraib.

Indefinite detention of American citizens.

Denial of habeas corpus.

Waterboarding.

Rendition.

Black sites.

It’s as if the books by Jane Meyer, Jack Goldsmith, Philippe Sands, and so many others have gone right down the memory hole.

Where’s the anger at this desecration of everything America supposedly stands for?  Where’s the condemnation of the Bush Administration’s trashing of the Constitution?  Where are the demands that these things stop, and stop immediately?

And where are the attacks on the man who most needs to answer for his role in not just allowing, but promoting these abominations?  Where is the condemnation and vilification of Dick Cheney?

There isn’t a politician more unpopular in America today.  More importantly, there isn’t anyone more responsible for the trashing of America’s reputation in the world.

Yet after two days, we’ve heard nothing about him or his comprehensive attack on human rights and civil liberties.  Nothing about his single-minded shredding of the Bill of Rights, Geneva Conventions, and Convention against Torture.  Nothing about waterboarding, sleep deprivation, the use of dogs, or forced confinement.  Nothing about the fact that our allies now believe that this Administration has committed war crimes.

We’ve heard plenty about windmills and wages, but nothing about Cheney’s conscious destruction of American values.

In less than a week, Dick Cheney will take the Darth Vader world tour to the Republican National Convention in St. Paul.  In his primetime speech, he will call Democrats weak, inept, and unwilling to face down “evil.”

If the Democrats fail to call him out on his own evil this week, he’ll be right.

Are Democrats afraid?  Are they unwilling to confront Bush, Cheney, and McCain on foreign policy?   Are they afraid of John McCain because he keeps reminding people on every possible occasion that he was a POW?

There’s a simple way to handle this.  All the Democrats have to say is that the Bush Administration believes that it doesn’t torture.  Then talk about all the things that they now do that the North Vietnamese did to John McCain.  And then point out that according to George Bush and Dick Cheney, John McCain wasn’t tortured. And then say how dare they implement polices once used against our brave servicemen and women.  And also make sure that people know that John McCain actually sanctions torture, as long as it’s committed by the CIA.

It’s the truth.  It reminds Americans of what we stand for without dragging them through the muck and horror of the past seven years.  It also has the advantage of putting both McCain and the Bushies on the defensive.

We’ve heard that Obama-Biden will be different, that they will no longer concede the high ground on foreign policy issues to the Republicans.  But if they never mention torture, Guantanamo, or any of the other terrors that Cheney, Addington, Yoo and company have inflicted on America and the world, then they are just as fearful and timorous as past candidates.

And next week, the Republicans will have free reign to make them look like apologists and traitors.

And in November, Barack Obama will lose.

Related posts

• Obama, Messaging, and Dean Wormer
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• Ambassador for All War Crimes except Our Own
• Prosecuting Those Responsible for War Crimes
• Was McCain Tortured? Ask Dick Cheney

Most of you already have forgotten all about the Olympics, but here at Undip, we already have London 2012 fever!  After all, who doesn’t want to see Jimmy Page balance his guitar on top of his walker while some eighteen-year-old in go-go boots mangles Whole Lotta Love?

Oh wait — that already happened.

All kidding aside, I’d like to share a few final thoughts on what arguably were the most discussed — and controversial — Olympics since Berlin 1936. First, let’s take a look at the winners.

1.  The Chinese government. Like it or not, the ChiComs pulled it off.  It was, in many ways, a spectacular show.  Despite some problems, embarrassments, and even a few unscripted moments, the Olympics that Hu Jintao and company wanted were the Olympics they got.  And most of the world bought their message hook, line, and sinker.

2.  Usain Bolt. The Jamaican sprinter not only captured three golds, but he managed to make Jacques Rogge cranky.  That alone made it a good Olympics.  Bolt looked particularly good when, a day after Rogge whined about his “antics,” a Cuban taekwondo athlete kicked an athlete in the face — and Bolt donated $50,000 of his prize money to earthquake relief as a “thank you to the Chinese people.”

3.  Michael Phelps (and his mom). Put it this way:  the Intertubes are still buzzing about the 100m fly.  Debbie Phelps will be the unexpected breakout star of the Olympics.

4.  Clean air. Does it matter whether the Chinese got lucky (rain at just the right moments) or actually knew what they were doing?  In the end, the pollution became a non-story.  And athletes who acted like it mattered — the American cyclists showing up in masks, the Ethiopian marathoner who passed on competing — looked foolish.

5.  Lopez Lomong. The Sudanese lost boy turned American flag bearer may not have won his race, but he had a gold medal moment.  Kudos as well to the American athletes who chose him for the job.

Related posts

• Controlympics: Losers (#2 of 4)
• Dillweed of the Day: Jacques Rogge
• Controlympics: China’s 21 Rules
• The Olympics’ Real Legacy: Greater Repression
• Reindeer Games: Bush, Human Rights, and China

The BBC is reporting that China has released the Westerners detained for protesting during the Olympics:

China has deported eight Americans detained in Beijing last week for demonstrating about Tibet during the Olympic Games. The eight left China on Sunday while the closing ceremony was taking place after American officials pressed for them to be released.

The eight should be thankful:  they were spared the horror of actually having to watch the closing ceremony.

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• Wonk’d: How to Cover the Olympics
• What Were You Thinking, Mary Carillo?
• The Olympics’ Real Legacy: Greater Repression
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• Dillweed of the Day: Jacques Rogge

Hey boys and girls, it’s time for the Closing Ceremonies!  You know, the ones that actually took place 12 hours ago!  The ones that NBC wouldn’t let you see until now!  And I’m here to give you tape-delayed play by play.

Let me admit up front that this is going to be pretty snarky.  If you’re looking serious analysis, go elsewhere.

Oh goody.  Comrade Joshua (Joshua Cooper-Ramo) is back.  NBC hasn’t even started showing the damn thing and I already want to hurl.  (For those who missed my tape-delayed blogging of the opening ceremonies, Comrade Joshua is a paid shill of the ChiComs er, I mean, a partner in the Beijing office of Kissinger Associates.  Oh wait — there’s no difference between the two, is there?)

Another massive fireworks display.  This one looks less like Triumph of the Will and more like CNN’s coverage of the first night of the Persian Gulf War.  I’m pretty sure that’s not what the ChiComs were going for.

The three stooges were just introduced:  Hu “Is Lying Now” Juntao, Juan Antonio “More of the” Samarach, and Gordon “I Will Have Trouble Getting Tickets to the London Games” Brown.

They’ve got Chinese in ethnic costumes again.  This time, it’s adults.  I wonder if they’re all Han Chinese again?

Something tells me that NBC is milking this for all they’ve got.  I think the first commercial break ran for something like 45 minutes.

Is it my imagination or do the drummers look like Iron Man wearing bike helmets?  Were they afraid they’d get conked by the guys bin the row behind them? Wait, they’re not just bike helmets — they’re bike helmets painted with gold glitter paint!

Molly just said that they guys hovering over the stadium look like they’re playing giant Gouda cheeses.  And why are the women dressed like Aztecs covered with glow brights?

I’m sorry, but that first piece looked like the North Korean version of cell mitosis.  At least the opening ceremonies made sense.  I mean this is so weird that even Comrade Joshua doesn’t have anything clever and butt-kissing to say.

Whoopsie — spoke too soon.  Apparently Comrade Joshua thinks that this is a representation of what Chinese philosophy will have to say in the future.  Uh, okaaay.

Have to say the guys on the giant unicycles are pretty cool.

Okay something looking like a giant white sperm just plunged into the big cell in the middle.  I’m telling you, it’s like a cross between Cirque de Soleil and your 8th grade sex ed class.

Terminator 6:  Arnold battles the cyborg pogo stick clones

I would not want to be the guys hanging off the underside of the gouda cheeses.

Time for another 206 minute commercial break.

Here come the athletes.  I wonder if NBC will show anyone other than the Americans, Europeans, Chinese, and Australians?  Maybe the Jamaicans.

Comrade Joshua is blathering again about harmony.  It’s like the reverse of It’s a Wonderful Life:  every time Comrade Joshua talks about harmony, another human rights activist gets thrown in jail.

Now he’s moanaing about how great the Chinese sports system is.  Now he’s calling the athletes an engineering project.  Nice analogy you twit.

I didn’t know they had found a way to miniaturize Shawn Johnson.

The third biggest star of the Games, behind Michel Phelps and Usain Bolt?  Michael Phelps’s mom.  I liked her new commercial, even though it’s sappy.

Once again, all happy and sappy commercials — until John McCain shows up, sounding like the grumpy uncle who can never enjoy the family picnic.

I wonder if they’re showing all of this on the big screens at the three protest zones. Heh.

Best parts of this are the replays of the best moments of the Games:  4×100 freestyle relay, Phelps’s amazing win in the 100 butterfly, Usain Bolt in the 100.  Still waiting for the Cuban guy kicking the ref in the face and the two little old Chinese women being sentenced to one year each in a reeducation through labor camp for attempting to organize a protest.

You want to know just how tape delayed this is?  Last night, NBC showed the tape delayed results of the men’s marathon.  Tonight, they’re showing that event’s medal ceremony, as it’s part of the closing ceremonies.  That’s not tape delayed, that’s the History Channel.

Sorry, but the kids escorting the athletes are really, really creepy looking.  I think they welded the smiles on their faces.

Comrade Joshua is talking about how all the volunteers spent a year getting ready.  Not to make light of the contributions of the volunteers, but reports of children spending twelve hour days after school each day practicing doesn’t sound to me like volunteerism.  As Zhang Yimou, who directed both the opening and closing ceremonies noted, “uniformity can bring beauty.”  Of course it also brings pain, nervous breakdowns, and a range of other maladies.

Now Joshua is talking about how great everything went.

Here comes Jacques “the slime-sucking, lying dillweed” Rogge.  He thanks the people of China and says these were sixteen days we will cherish forever.  Except the people thrown in jail, of course.

A choir is singing “God Save the Queen.”  In China.  So much for communism.

They’re lowering the Olympic flag, and you can see empty seats in the background.

What’s up with this double-decker bus?  First of all, it’s incredibly ugly.  Second, didn’t they discontinue those?  And the pantomime Londoners are worse than the Chinese.  Oh man, the British presentation is just freaking awful.  I take back everything bad I ever said about the Chinese portion of the ceremonies.

I think Leona Lewis is lip-syncing Enya.   Oh. My. God.  Now she’s lip-syncing Whole Lotta Love.  With a 200-year old Jimmy Page guitar-syncing.

The London section is so freaking bizarre.  What were they thinking?  What is Jimmy Page thinking?  This is worse than a really bad high school production of Hair.  All the athletes are standing around not quite sure how to react.

And now David Beckham?  Did someone slip me a tab of really good acid?  Am I high?  WTF?

Mary Carillo just said, “nice taste of London.”  Really?  Have you ever freaking been to London Mary?  Go back to the Three Gorges Dam and jump off.  Now.  Please.

Okay, there are ten thousand athletes here and they’re using actors to play the athletes leaving.  Maybe they can take Mary Carillo with them.

Comrade Joshua just said all 91,000 spectators were “trained” ahead of time to wave red lanterns.  Apparently the training didn’t work, because most of them are taking pictures instead.

The Chinese are now trying to win back the gold medal for bizarre ceremonies from the British.  Two guys covered head-to-to in white chalk are dancing on top of a giant five story tower.

The flame just went out.  I can’t help thinking of the flame held by the goddess of democracy in Tiananmen Square back in 1989.  Maybe someday a Chinese government will finally recognize which flame was more important.

The five-story tower is now writhing, covered with humans in silver and red jumpsuits.  I know I should be impressed by these feats, but all I can think of are swarming bugs.  Part of the problem is I keep hearing Zhang talking about how much he admires the North Koreans.

Mary Carillo just called it the “holy flame” of the Olympics.  I’m about to start calling her Comrade Mary.

The red strips of cloth on the five-story tower make it look like that scene from Priscilla, Queen of the Desert where Guy Pearce is strapped onto the top of the bus.

Why do all male pop singers in China look like the Back Street Boys channeling Elvis in Memphis circa 1968?

OMG it’s the Chinese version of the video for Robert Palmer’s Addicted to Love.  Except the girls are smiling.  And wearing yellow tops and white pants.  And playing an electrified version of a traditional Chinese instrument.  But other than that, it’s almost identical.

I think they’ve cloned Daft Funk.  There are something like 200 guys in track suits, glow-brights, and  motorcycle helmets bouncing up and down like yo-yos.

It’s official: Bollywood music seriously kicks Chinese pop music’s butt.  This song that Wei Wei is singing is just bloody dreadful.

Jackie Chan can’t sing.

Molly just said that the goal of the closing ceremony should not be to make you want to shut off your tee vee.  Can’t say I disagree with her.  Chinese pop music is a crime against humanity.  It’s so bad that they’ve managed to silence Comrade Joshua.  Even he can’t rationalize this away.

They just don’t know how to end this, do they?  Please tell me that the confetti cannons and fireworks are the end.

Now they’re in London, via the BBC.  Has the BBC not gotten around to upgrading to High Definition yet?  And who is this moron interviewing Michael Phelps?  He sounds like the host of Top of the Pops.

It. Is. Over.

Related posts

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• Controlympics: Losers (#2 of 4)
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A first-person account of how the ChiComs are keeping Beijing safe for Olympocracy:

So we were returning to Beijing from Datan and had to take a coach bus from Fengning County seat. . . . Although the Olympics had put a tense atmosphere over the whole country, we didn’t think about it too seriously. Even with the Games, people still have to eat, sleep, go to the toilet and travel around. We were returning to Beijing, not to make trouble there.

But we were still asked for our ID and got our card numbers recorded. Although Fu Guoli lost his ID card, he is a gentleman-faced guy and works for a Global 500 company and we couldn’t imagine he would have a problem. . . .

When the bus pulled out of town, I was sitting next to Fu Guoli and while we were chatting the bus pulled over. When we walked off the bus we first saw cops, who set up two checkpoints along the highway and two policemen in bullet-proof vests with light machine guns were minding the booths. We were submitting our ID cards one after another along a rail line. For those who have the second generation of IDs, a scan can tell whether it’s real or fake; but for those first generation ones, your information needs to be entered into a computer and then a matching program will confirm its authenticity.

I passed without any problem. But Fu Guoli showed his work badge and reported his ID number, seemingly not much a hassle, but was taken aside by the cops. From 1:00 to 1:20 am, I saw through the bus window that he was constantly talking to the cops and was not allowed to board, and we realized something was wrong. . . . [W]hen Fu gave them his ID number, the computer couldn’t find his record, and neither could the system find his name. Which is to say, the police concluded that Fu has no valid ID record, which means he couldn’t be allowed back to Beijing.  He was, finally, left behind with police at Fengning, not able to return to Beijing.

The police were not sympathetic to Fu’s plight.  One told him, “Even [if] the problem [is] the database, it is still your problem. We still cannot let you go.”

So the Chinese not only kicked people out for the Olympics, they also set up a network of security checkpoints that enable them to allow back in only those with correct identity card.  It’s the rebirth of the old internal passport system, which had largely broken down as a result of the big labor migrations of the capitalist era.  And judging by this account, the new system will be far more efficient than the old one, with the Chinese now issuing “second generation” smart cards (I’m guessing with scannable RFID chips) to all Beijing residents.

What will be interesting is who they let back in — and when they allow them to return.  Over time, corruption and labor shortages will in all likelihood cause the system to break down again, but for now, the government has complete control over access to the city.

Given that, things will never not go back to the way they were.  The old messy, wonderful, interesting Beijing is probably gone forever.  The new, controlled, antiseptic Beijing, which has become the world’s largest  Potemkin Village, is here to stay.

Translation by and big tip of the hat to China Digital Times.

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So as you’ve probably heard by now, the ChiComs have not allowed a single protest to take place in the three designated zones.  Not one.  Here are some of the details:

• Chinese officials, by their own admission, have received 77 applications to hold protests.  They have not approved a single one, stating that 74 had been withdrawn because their concerns had been “properly addressed by relevant authorities or departments through consultations.” The other three were rejected for “incomplete information” or violating Chinese law.
• At least six and as many as eight people have been detained for attempting to organize protests after the government announced that it was settng up the zones.  The families of several of them have not heard anything since their arrests.
• Two elderly women, aged 79 and 77, have been sentenced to a year of “re-education through labor” for “disturbing the public order,” after they repeatedly applied for a permit to demonstrate in one of the offical zones.  They were objecting to what they felt was insufficient payment for the demolition of their homes. When one women’s daughter attempted to apply for a permit to protest the arrest, officials refused to give her the forms.
• Gao Chuancai, a farmer from northeast China, was forcibly escorted back to his hometown and remains in custody after he attempted to organize a demonstration against public corruption.
• Five Americans were arrested for an unauthorized protest after they used LEDs to spell out “Free Tibet” near the Bird’s Nest.  The display lasted for a grand total of twenty seconds before police took it down.  Three other protesters were arrested after trying to use lasers to project the same message on a downtown landmark.
• In response, the IOC made the following statement to The Financial Times:  “The IOC is not in a position to dictate to city authorities how to run their affairs. However, protest zones are a best practice from previous Olympic host cities for dealing with peaceful protesters who use the platform of the Olympic Games.  We continue to ask for greater transparency from Beijing city authorities concerning the official protest zones in parks near Olympic venues and would like to see them genuinely used in Beijing.”

What’s so sad about all of this is that it was completely unnecessary.  For argument’s sake, let’s say that the ChiComs let all 77 protests go forward.  In zones that average Chinese are avoiding like the plague.  Nobody would have noticed and the IOC wouldn’t have complained.

It’s not like the Chinese haven’t done this before:  in 1995, they hosted the World Conference on Women.  They set aside protest zones.  It was messy, but for the most part it went by unnoticed by the average Chinese.

So what has changed this time around?  What are their spies telling them?  Is there something more to this, or is it about face?

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Yes, it was the Opening Ceremony, so our standards should start out pretty low.  The Chinese, of course, were not content with that.  So they put together a show to end all shows.  And almost everyone was blown away.

Except now, all those journalists running around Beijing keep discovering problems.  First it was the lip-syncing 8-year-old.  Then it was the computer-generated fireworks.  Then it was forcing the hostesses to audition naked; the go-go girls forced to rehearse until their faces almost froze in a smile; and the soldiers moving the giant scroll forced to wear diapers.  Now, it turns out all those annoyingly happy children in ethnic costumes — the ones I complained about during my blogging of NBC’s tape-delayed coverage, the ones who handed the Chinese flag off to goosestepping soldiers — also were fake:

[During the] opening ceremony. . .the children supposedly representing the country’s 56 ethnic groups were in fact all from the same one, the majority Han Chinese Race.

The children carried the national flag into the Bird’s Nest National Stadium, before handing it over to soldiers to raise at the most solemn moment of the ceremony.

They were dressed in costumes associated with the country’s ethnic minorities, including those from troubled areas such as Tibet and the muslim province of Xinjiang. Such displays of “national unity” are a compulsory part of any major state occasion.

But the children were all from the Han Chinese majority, which makes up more than 90 per cent of the population and is culturally and politically dominant, according to an official with the cultural troupe from which they were selected. . . .

This point was put to Wang Wei, executive vice-president of the Beijing organizing committee at a press conference today.  “I think you are being very meticulous,” he said. He said it was “traditional” to use dancers from other ethnic groups in this way.  “I would argue it is normal for dancers, performers, to be dressed in other races’ clothes,” he said. “I don’t know exactly where these performers are from.”

. . .The mother of one of the children involved. . .said [the children's performance] involved grueling days of rehearsal, from 3 pm sometimes until 2 am the next morning.

Meticulous?  As opposed to forcing children to rehearse for twelve hours after school?  I think the word you’re looking for is exploitative.  In most of the rest of the world, forcing kids to spend twelve hours doing anything would be called child labor.

Photo:  Andy in Beijing via Flickr, using a Creative Commons license.

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