Tom Watson

Have You Ever Seen a Hangman Tie a Hangknot?

If there's one blog post you take the time to read today, it should be this one by Ezekiel Edwards on the DMIblog. Here's how it begins, but please read the whole thing. It's a stunner.

I am going to tell a brief story. Tell me whether you think it takes place in 1957 or 2007.

There is a small town of under 3,000 people. There is a high school in the town. There is a tree at the school known as the "white tree", because only white kids sit under it.

A black student asks school officials for permission to sit under the "white tree".  The student receives permission.

A group of black students then sit under the "white tree."

The next day, three nooses, in school colors, are hanging from the "white tree."

Read it all.

I'm the King of Torture (No I'm the King of Torture)

Last night in South Carolina, eight middle-aged white men - including a couple of Jesus-loving Bible-thumpers - fell over each other trying to let Republicans know that they've got that true 24 mentality.

You know, they'd go pretty darned far like that handsome, gritty Jack Bauer character, if American citizens ever found themselves in a far-fetched comic book scenario obviously dreamed up between refills from Roger Ailes' Scotch decanter high above Sixth Avenue.

The sneering curl that is Brit Hume's upper lip was wet with some kind of spook-driven desire for action when he laid things out: simultaneous attacks on three U.S. shopping malls (oh, please spare Build-A-Bear, Mr.Terrorist) rock the nation as a coordinated caravan of munitions-laden Mercedes GL-450s infiltrates underground parking garages, piloted by terrorists disguised as JC Penney shoppers (I may be misremembering a detail or two). A terrorist with detailed knowledge of another imminent and deadlier attack had been captured and taken to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. OK, Republican old men - how far would you go?

Not one of them pointed out that this Foxy scenario was awfully close to the 2002 epic Collateral Damage, starring the nation's most prominent and popular Republican who cannot be President. But most of them responded with some version of the movie's hooky tagline: "The Act Itself Wasn't Personal...HIS VENGEANCE WILL BE."

Mitt Romney: Close Gitmo?! Hell, I'll double Gitmo!

Rudy Giuliani: "Every method" that can possibly be construed as not being the T-word.

The Other Guys Nobody Knows: "I as President will authorize extreme measures." [Roughly paraphrased].

With two notable exceptions, they all did the manly-man dance of faux toughness. Tom Tancredo, the immigrant-bashing fencing contractor, actually said he was "looking for a Jack Bauer."

The exceptions to the torture bandwagon were the actual torture victim and the actual conservative. Andrew Sullivan:

Some issues really are paramount moral ones. Two candidates opposed it clearly and honorably: McCain and Paul. All the others gleefully supported it - including Brownback. He's a born-again Christian for torture. Giuliani revealed himself as someone we already know. He would have no qualms in exercising executive power brutally, no scruples or restraints. Romney would double the size and scope of Gitmo, to ensure that none of the detainees have lawyers, regardless of their innocence or guilt. That is in itself a disqualification for the presidency of the United States. A man who has open contempt for the most basic rules of Western justice has no business being president.

Then there was Mike Huckabee's canned one-liner about John Edwards and his expenses at the "beauty parlor." How subtle. Edwards is not a manly Republican type because he spends money on his coif. Say effete elitist. Whisper "gay." This as his obviously beloved wife is dying. So much for Mike Huckabee's aw-shucks nice guy conservative pose.

The Republicans with their failed national leader, their deadly pointless war, their domestic incompetence, and their endless scandals don't have much to grapple on to. The insightful Digby:

It was quite interesting watching the Republicans debate down in South Carolina tonight. I think it's clear that this group has come to fully understand that winning the GOP nomination is all about the codpiece. These guys have just spent the last fifteen minutes of the debate trying to top each other on just how much torture they are willing to inflict. They sound like a bunch of psychotic 12 year olds, although considering the puerile nature of the "24" question it's not entirely their fault.

This debate is a window into what really drives the GOP id. The biggest applause lines were for faux tough guy Giuliani demanding Ron Paul take back his assertion that the terrorists don't hate us for our freedom, macho man Huckabee talking about Edwards in a beauty parlor and the manly hunk Romney saying that he wants to double the number of prisoners in Guantanamo "where they can't get lawyers." There's very little energy for that girly talk about Jesus or "the culture of life" or any of that BS that the pansy Bush ran ran on.

See, there's nothing there to run on - so it's all slogans about slogans about 9-11 about slogans. As Jim Wolcott said (while inching his thumb toward the channel marker on the remote):

"Some of these candidates are convinced that the US can stay indefinitely in Iraq (retreat equals defeat) and confront Iran and reduce the price of gas for the average American family on their Sunday drive to the church or synagogue of their choice."

Maybe next time, the moderators will invent a better scenario - one that requires more thought. I liked the what-if dreamed up by Britt Peterson over at The Plank:

I keep imagining an alternate scenario: Chris Wallace asking, "So, if your plane had crashed on a remote island that might or might not be purgatory and/or a big science experiment and/or a figment of your imagination, and on this island, along with a lot of improbably beautiful women, some polar bears, a smoke monster, and an army of natives who are constantly trying to kidnap your women and children, was a former member of the Iraqi Army who (let's just say) knew how to use 'enhanced techniques' to get information -- and if also on that island was a conman who had stashed all the medicine that was on your plane and was refusing to give it up to a girl having an asthma attack -- and if you were a world-class surgeon with daddy issues who really, really wanted to save the day -- would you sic the Iraqi torturer on the conman in order to get the girl's inhaler? Now would you, sir?"

That's almost better than a rerun of Gilligan's Island. Almost.

Where's New Orleans?

Easter Weekend 2007, originally uploaded by codyaya.

Two long debates, 18 candidates, four hours of naked ambition. No discussion of the great domestic failure of our times - the ongoing tragedy of the official national abandonment of New Orleans.

You would expect this from the Republicans; they posed as if angling for the mantle of Reagan at his tacky and Disneyesque "library" - all that's missing is the gruesome Leninesque attraction at the center - but they're really jockeying for the legacy of George W. Bush. They want the nomination of a failed political party, one that will have to be rebuilt from scratch after its fully disgraced leader finally leaves office.

The posed as "conservatives" but more or less spewed the same tired talking points that didn't seem conservative at all (excepting Ron Paul) and aimed their manly goodness at the mythical "Daddy Party" primary voters of clueless Beltway Bubble Babushkas like Maureen Dowd.

You might expect the cold Republicans to pass on an issue that their fearless leader has actually handled less competently than the war; after all, its religious right wing reacted to the destruction with statements like this one from Repent America director Michael Marcavage [tip Americablog]:

Although the loss of lives is deeply saddening, this act of God destroyed a wicked city. From 'Girls Gone Wild' to 'Southern Decadence,' New Orleans was a city that had its doors wide open to the public celebration of sin. From the devastation may a city full of righteousness emerge.

Sure, they wouldn't actually say it, but the GOP candidates (four of whom bragged that they don't believe in evolution) embrace people like this because they know exactly how they'll vote if lied to in just the right tone.

Malign neglect is to be expected from the modern Republican Party, but where were the Democrats?

Why wasn't New Orleans front and center for the Democrats; why isn't a central issue on the campaign trail? Why don't all the candidate websites contain a plan, a proposal, the account of some working being done on behalf a great American city that is being allowed to die.

Here's a sad truth: American Idol did a better job in its recent fundraising campaign of highlighting the ongoing horror of southern Louisiana than did Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John Edwards, Bill Richardson, Joe Biden Chris Dodd, Dennis Kucinich, and that talkative guy from Alaska in their nationally-televised first debate.

You know - Iraq is easy. The war is lost; it could never have been won in the first place. The troops will be coming home, and the chapter has basically be written. Iraq is a softball for the Democrats, even those who voted for authorization of force. It's an international calamity that will be felt for a generation, and we need a serious grown-up to clean up the mess. That's a quick story to tell voters.

New Orleans is much more difficult to campaign on. Yeah, the performance of the Bush Administration was criminal - but in this race, criticism on the left also demands solutions, demands results, demands collaboration and a plan. No progressive Democrat can merely run on Bush's failure in Louisiana - the base incompetence and the images of death and political abandonment have no shelf life; and Bush is not running.

Americans expect...check that...hope that Democrats can provide solutions, especially on a domestic issue. This is what we say we're good at.

My point is this: prove it.

New Orleans is failing, stagnant, dying. The do-gooders have left, the news crews have long-since packed the choppers and camera trucks. FEMA is auctioning off the trailers, some of which were never occupied. It's yesterday's news. New Orleans has half the population it did before Katrina. The drug trade has returned stronger than ever, and murders are surging. Basic health care is faltering, breaking down. the city's education system is being redrawn from the bottom up (this may be a good thing). Thousands of buildings remain abandoned. They're still pushing tourism and music (you can take a Katrina bus tour), but as RJ Eskow said this week: "It's a theme park in the middle of apocalypse." The media has moved on. The only time it shows up in a New York paper is when the Mets option a player to their Triple-A affiliate there.

If you're a top tier candidate for the Democratic nomination, you've got a big platform. You're allowed to parachute in and make some noise. You're allowed to call people out, to make bold proposals, to drag the sleepy, hung-over press corps with you.

My message to Senators Clinton, Obama, and Edwards (and you can throw in Biden and Dodd, if you'd like) is simple - this ain't the Senate. Go out and smack some people around on New Orleans. Blow off the inevitable photo opps, and start a few political fires. If a talented and deep pool of Democratic candidates for President cannot summon the political will to change the course of that wonderful city, who can?

Further, if the Democrats who want the Oval Office more than oxygen or water or sunlight can't expend their well-financed political capital to help save a dying city, to hell with 'em - for to hell, they certainly will belong.

Oxford - Turl Street

Oxford - Turl Street, originally uploaded by Tom Watson.

This was the view last evening as I took a short stroll after the opening session of the Skoll World Forum for Social Entrepreneurship here in Oxford. I'm blogging the conference at onPhilanthropy, where I'm the publisher. Some tremendous ideas and personalities, so please tune in.

Meet Matthew Shepard's Mom

Over at the day job, I interviewed Judy Shepard, mother of murdered gay student Matthew Shepard, whose killing became a leading cause in the gay rights movement - check that - the civil rights movement. Here's a key quote from Judy, who mourned her son's death on a Wyoming road and then started a major foundation with her husband in his name:

 The world has changed and for the better I think.  Unfortunately, that is not what we read in the press.  At the grassroots level there is a greater understanding and a desire to make things right - especially among young people.  If I were to say more tolerant, I would be conceding that tolerance is all we are looking for.  It is acceptance that is needed.

The article discusses how Judy Shepard built the foundation, raised money and consciousness, and where she intends to take it from here. A very strong, committed woman - another modern times everyday hero.

George Bush's Noose

So the line grows of Iraqis volunteering to hang Saddam Hussein. You may assume this will be a rare act in the new Iraq, a singular national death sentence, an extraordinary happening. You'd be wrong. The regime supported by American lives, by American blood, by American treasure is a massive machine of civil murder. In short, our billions tie the hangman's noose for hundreds of Iraqis convicted in courts reconstituted by American lawyers. On the jump of Kirk Semple's Hussein piece in the Times today:

The death penalty in Iraq, which applies to a range of crimes including terrorism and certain categories of murder, was suspended in 2003 by the American occupation authorities but reinstated in August 2004. Since then, 51 people — men and several women — have been hanged and about 170 are currently on death row awaiting execution or the outcome of their appeal, according to Hashim al-Shibli, Iraq’s justice minister.

Those are the official numbers. The high-ranking government official involved in the executions process said the actual number of hangings was far higher, though fewer than 100, because of three sets of hangings that took place between December 2005 and March 2006 and were never publicized.

Human rights groups have questioned the transparency of the criminal justice system in Iraq and the ability of defendants to get a fair trial.

Hangings. Paid for by Americans. By the dozens. This is the new democracy?  We're hanging one barbarian, while another sits in the justice ministry - presumably standing up while we stand down. Do the neocons approve of this:

Death is supposed to come instantly — a doctor is on hand to certify it — and the bodies are removed to a cooler where they are held before being handed over to the victims’ families. The entire process is recorded by a photographer and a video cameraman and the images are stored in a government archive.

But the hangings have not always gone smoothly.

Until the new gallows were built, the Iraqi government used an apparatus and an old rope left over from Mr. Hussein’s government, said the high-ranking government official. The rope had become so elastic that it would sometimes take as much as eight minutes to kill the convicted person.

On Sept. 6, the Iraqi authorities planned to hang 27 people. On the 13th hanging, according to an official who was there, the rope snapped and the convicted man plummeted 15 feet through the trap door onto the concrete floor. “God saved me!” the man cried. “God is great! I did not deserve this!” For an hour, he lay on the ground praying and shouting while prison guards and the executioner debated whether this constituted divine intervention and, if so, whether the man’s life should be spared. Once a new rope was rigged, however, the man was forced up the stairs once again and successfully hanged.

Time's special report two weeks ago detailed a surge in hangings by our partners in the new Iraq:

An adviser to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki says the government plans to execute "two or three more batches of 14 or 15 each" in the coming months...."From the Iraqi point of view," says al-Maliki's adviser, "they don't like to see a lot of people get killed every day and have a low number of executions."

Who built the Iraqi gallows? We did:

Hangings are conducted in secret, at a heavily fortified location in Baghdad built by an American contractor.

In short, one of the most horrible postscripts in this horrible war is the assembly line of hangings we've helped to create in Iraq. I guess it will make a nice exhibit in the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Research Center.

Amendments of Failure

Gay Marriage Protests, originally uploaded by jvadnais.

Some pundits took the passage of seven out of eight state initiatives banning gay marriage as a sign of the socially conservative cast of the American electorate, and a warning to those wild-eyed, man-on-dog Democrats to move quickly to the center. I took it a different way. To put it simply, the social conservatives are running low on ammunition.

The bigoted anti-homosexual streak through America has grown ever narrower in my lifetime, but it's still enough to get some folks all bothered, still enough to put silly amendments denying civil rights on the ballot, and still enough to prop up the dying far right religious party that used to be the GOP since Reagan.

But the all-in throw of the gay marriage haters - indeed, Mitt Romney's pathetic fliperoo to try and become the David Duke of sexual orientation - is, to me, a clear sign of desperation.

Fear-based, biblical legislation is a total flop in this country of late. And demographics are the reason. The boomer generation is beginning to move from pure money-making to society-changing mode, windmilling their arms like 60-something Pete Townshend as they get back into the activist business - this time without the tie-dye and acid, but with every bit of the pure confidence in their mission they once displayed on campus. It's a socially liberal generation, by and large; economics, foreign policy and other matters are more disparate.

Then too, the young people on the way up also display a pure form of tolerance that bordered on bored disinterest (this thrills me, frankly). When my kids are my age they'll look back and laugh at the ludicrous idea of constitutional amendments against gay marriage. Dad, were you crazy?

Finally, there are the libertarians to contend with. In the still-smoldering wreckage of the Republicans of Reagan, a small band of constitutionalists remains. They abhor government injection into private life more than almost any other action by the public sector and they're in direct opposition to the interventionist religionistas. Question is: when do they speak up?

No, these lame amendments (and let's pause for a cheer for the great state of Arizona, which rejected the proposition) were one of the last big gasps of the intolerance agenda. I believe they'll be relegated to an annoying and vocal minority. Let's work for it.

Return of the Nativist

The history of Irish immigration to America is grand indeed, but the chronicle of overcoming adversity and bigotry has always been marred by the flare-ups of our own version of arriviste nativism. Predominantly Irish rioters rampaged through the streets of New York in 1863, as blacks become the scapegoat for Irish anger over the Civil War draft. In the 1870s Irish American immigrants attacked Chinese immigrants in the western states, driving them out of smaller towns. Immigrant Denis Kearney led a mass movement in San Francisco in 1877 that threatened harm to railroad owners if they hired any Chinese. For immigrants so recently and flamboyantlhy deined their own rights, these episodes are a black mark on the long struggle of Irish Catholics in America.

And then there's Jim Gilchrist.

Gilchrist, whose name in Gaelic means "servant of Christ," is an Irish Catholic American who sends me emails urging support for his Minuteman Project.

The ironically-surnamed Gilchrist founded the Minuteman Project two years ago, with the aim of stemming the flow of illegal immigrants from across the border in Mexico. Gilchrist and his band spread a thin veneer of law enforcement and grassroots political credibility across their organization, but the Minuteman Project is nothing short of a return of the Nativists, that know-nothing, last one in shut the door bunch of haters that opposed European immigration a century ago. And sadly, the Minutemen - and one Jim Gilchrist - are the direct descendants of the haters who lynched the blacks and the Chinese in the 19th century.

That this movement is led by another Irish Catholic, the child of an immigrant culture that faced ethnic and religious persecution on these shores, is both sad and horrifying to this Irish Catholic.

Make no mistake, the Minuteman Project is a project of hate. While it describes itself as "a citizens' Neighborhood Watch on our border" - "white Martin Luther Kings" in Gilchrist's words - their actions tell another story.

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a well-respected civil rights organization, white supremacists and neo-Nazi's are prominent Minutemen. At the group's rally last April kicking off a month of volunteer "patrols" along the border, members of the racist National Alliance were in action:

Prominent among the demonstrators were two men who confided that they were members of the Phoenix chapter of the National Alliance — the largest neo-Nazi group in America. One of the two, who sat in lawn chairs throughout, held a sign with arrows depicting invading armies of people from Mexico — a sign identical to National Alliance billboards and pamphlets, except without the Alliance logo.

In fact, National Alliance pamphlets were distributed in Tombstone and this predominantly Hispanic community just two days before the Minuteman Project got going. "Non-Whites are turning America into a Third World slum," they read. "They come for welfare or to take our jobs. Let's send them home now."

Then there was Minuteman volunteer Joe McCutchen, carrying his .38 snub nose automatic. Here's his take on the immigrants:

"A lot of these people coming in, they're diseased. They've got tuberculosis, leprosy. I mean, you don't even want to touch them unless you're wearing gloves. So why the hell should we pay our taxes to cure them? ... They're turning our country into a Third World dumping ground. We're losing our language to them, losing our culture. They're taking over, and if we don't stop [immigration], our society will not survive. That's why I'm here."

On their so-called patrols, the Minutemen say they will peaceably detain illegals and call local law enforcement. But during one incident last year, members of the group physically assaulted a young Mexican and forced him to be photographed wearing a T-shirt with a Minuteman slogan on it - you know, just for laughs.

Gilchrist knows the language of the haters of the far right, the quasi-David Duke code words, the kind of language that might pass Pat Buchanan muster. Here's what he told Fox News host Alan Colmes last year:

Alan, there are supremacist groups out there of all races, colors and creeds. It's not just white supremacists. Why are you picking on them? There are brown. There are purple. There are red.

Yeah, those purple supremacist groups are a real threat to our way of life. A month ago, a group of students from my alma mater rushed the stage when Gilchrist was booked to speak at Columbia, and fought a brief, pitched battle with his handlers. Reading what Gilchrist has said over the past few years, they would have been far more effective in their goal of marginalizing his views by letting him speak.

With an election only five days away, Gilchrist was hitting the send button big-time this week, penning this little missive from one Irish Catholic to another:

"We aren't taking anything for granted. We know the American people agree with us, by a large majority, a super-majority, but we are continuing to work with pro-security candidates to get our message out. If Americans who care about border security don't get out to vote this election, we can kiss the United States Constitution goodbye - but I believe we will see a great turnout, and it will be because no true American wants to lose his country for lack of border security."

Haters like Gilchrist hide behind "security" and immigration quotas, but always manage to slip that little "culture" thing in there, as if American culture wasn't polyglot, an ever-shifting amalgam of rich influences from everywhere on the planet. Funny, that's exactly what white Protestants said about Gilchrist's kind a hundred or more years ago: these Irish will change our culture, and for the worse. Perhaps Jim Gilchrist should peruse some of the literature of the day, it reads like a Minuteman's diary, substituting Mexican for Irish, of course. [Does he even realize that 75% of Mexican immigrants are Catholics? Does he see any hypocrisy?] From an 1854 short story:

"I can't imagine, Carrie, why you object so strongly to a Roman Catholic."

"Why, Edward, they are so ignorant, filthy, and superstitious. It would never do to trust the children alone with one, for there is no telling what they might learn."

One of the candidates this proud Irish-American touts for Congress next Tuesday is Republican Randy Graf of Arizona, who is for the open 8th CD against Democrat Gabrielle Giffords. Graf doesn't just support the Minutemen - he is a Minuteman [that's him on the left "on patrol" in the fight for freedom of the borders]. The district is 84% white and on the border with Mexico, so my guess is Gilchrist's gang and Graf's campaign believed an anti-immigration push would keep the seat in GOP hands. Here's what they say:

You can help strike a blow against the powerful groups in Washington that continue to condone the massive violation of our national borders. You can be a part of taking Minuteman Project to the next level by helping  Randy Graf get elected to Congress where he will serve alongside Rep. Tom Tancredo and work for you to stop the border invasion.

Not happening. According to Real Clear Politics, a fairly conservative site, Giffords is dominating Graf by an average of 10 points in the cumulative polling. Graf is losing despite the very public endorsement of Mr. Straight Talk, John McCain, who clearly will do anything to try and get the conservative base behind his craven White House bid. Graf is being laughed out of Arizona.

See, the thing to remember about the Nativists and the Know-nothings and the Klan, and all the various leagues of hatred and prejudice, is that they failed in the end. Such will be the failure of the Minutemen on Tuesday. And this Irish American will be staying up late to watch another Irish American get buried politically.

My Favorite Blogger

Mukhtaran Bibi, the inspiring human rights advocate from Pakistan, has a blog. I can't read it, and chances are you can't either. It's in Urdu, hosted by the BBC's Urdu language news service. And it has already become a center within the Urdu diaspora for thos who battle against Medieval laws and violence against women. From the BBC UK feature story on Mukhtar Mai's blog:

"Mostly I talk about incidents which are cruel and painful. I try to discuss only the most serious things in my blog: the poor treatment of women, sometimes leading to killing," she says.

Mukhtar Mai's blog is unique. Although she cannot read or write, she tells her stories to a local BBC journalist, who types it up as a web diary.

And it provides an insight not only into the crimes committed by men against rural women, but also the hardships of their daily lives.

"I sometimes talk about my childhood memories - events that take place at my schools; or perhaps just about the household chores.

"I don't think that the people in our village know what it's all about and what I am writing. But I've received a few e-mails from other places - people who have been reading my blog on line and who encourage me to continue."

When Mukhtar Mai says her blog has prompted a few emails, she does herself a disservice. Scores of emails have flooded into the BBC Urdu site, in response to her diary. Mostly they are from men and mostly they have been encouraging.

"Mukhtar Mai, you have begun a wonderful thing. Such crimes as the one committed against you will continue to happen if the powerful continue to harass the weak," says one man.

"May God grant you the power to continue your endeavour. For the illiterate people of the village, it's not easy to bring these thugs to justice," says another.

Long-time readers of my blog know that Mai's story moved me deeply when the NYT's Nicholas Kristof first brough it to the world's attention two years ago. The survivor of a court-ordered gang rape in rural Pakistan, Mukhtar Mai refused the traditional path of suicide and shame to fight her attackers (and their protectors in the Pakistani government). She won a settlement and opened schools to teach young people to read and write - and to understand tolerance.

Below are some links to a few of the long series of posts, in case you're interested in the background. I haven't written about her in a while, but she remains one of the great heroines of our age - a living symbol of courage. Now she's my favorite blogger.

Mukhtaran Bibi, Hero
Mukhtaran Bibi Speaks
Blogs to the Rescue
Musharraf = Coward
Rape and Public Relations
Truth to Power
On Consulate Row
Mukhtar Mai, I Bow to You
Misogynist Allies
World Watches Mukhtar Mai

Visiting the Border

My son and I took a short trip to the border this weekend, a place where anyone with anything to say about American immigration should spend an hour or two in silent contemplation. I'm talking about Terminal Four at JFK, the best place in New York to get a clear picture of the magnetism of these United States in under 60 minutes.

While we waited for my brother's plane (he was returning from a month in Africa with his girlfriend in the Peace Corps), we sat quietly on a luggage cart and watched the arrivals.

Even as Washington argues immigration policy, the real battle is about culture - the smiling Pat Buchanan face on Republican politics that chuckles like your favorite right-wing uncle while slipping American society the deadly shiv of "Anglo culture" and "Judeo-Christian tradition."

The scowling, pinstriped Lou Dobbs crowd finds an economic argument they like amid a huge field of better arguments they don't, and they talk about the rule of law. But they're really grasping for the America they grew up in - a place where the browns, and blacks, and grays knew their place.

"Why does everyone want to come here, Dad?" asked my 11-year-old at the airport as we split a pack of Twizzlers. He'd watched tearful reunions, huge rolling carts piled with cases, men exchanging dual-cheeked kisses, and chattering in Arabic, Hebrew, Russian, German, Japanese, and languages neither of us could identify. "Because it's the place to be," I said - a quick, slangy answer but I meant every syllable.

It is the place to be. And while competent security is vital, an open source America must endure. Despite our problems, we're like honey to an aspiring world. Immigrants are our strength. Just spend an hour in Terminal Four.

Oh and meanwhile, check out Andrea's first column - on immigration and Mr. Dobbs - in the Daily News. She's gonna be a regular.

The U.N. Cowers

Bowing to pressure from the regime of Pakistani strongman Pervez Musharraf, the United Nations cancelled an appearace by international human rights figure Mukhtaran Bibi Friday, banning her from doing a live interview with Soledad O'Brien sponsored by the New York-based charity Virtue Foundation. As readers of this blog know, Mukhtar Mai (as she is also known) was sentenced to be gang-raped by village elders in her village in Pakistan; instead of killing herself under the primitive honor system of the rural provinces, she used went to court and used a government settlement to found a school for illiterate villagers (like herself). Readers of this blog also know that she's my hero, a living symbol for modern times and the challenge of advancing modernity and human rights while respecting tradition and regional/religious differences. According to The Times, when "asked why the United Nations bowed to the Pakistani protest, Shashi Tharoor, the under secretary general for communications, said he could not comment on this specific case. But, he said: "As a general principle, indeed there are written instructions guiding the holding of any event on United Nations premises in which we are obliged to take into account views formally expressed by member states. This is a building and an organization that belongs to the member states." What the Pakistani government still does not realize is that Mukhtaran Bibi's story has spread throughout the free world (yeah, helped by a bunch of you bloggers, God love ya) and it's stronger than anything General Musharraf has at his disposal. Mukhtar Mai is world's foremost Pakistani, and she can only be a force for good - muzzling her at the U.N. (with pathetic technocratic complicity by that body itself) can do nothing to stifle her message. Blogger Bill Petti has it right when he notes "to say that they are on the wrong side of this one would be an understatement ... how they can let a country like Pakistan protest this appearance is beyond me." And for once, the National Review's headline sums it up best: "The Shameful, Cravenly U.N. vs. the Bravest Woman on Earth."

Woman of Honor

Last night Mukhtaran Bibi accepted $20,000 and a modern red figurine as one of Glamour magazine's women of the year during a celebrity-studded ceremony at Lincoln Center. But as the slight figure in simple white attire with the traditional dupatta over her head walked to the stage and spoke softly to the gliterati from the world of fashion and media, the designer-cosetted crowd rose as one and real tears fell on couture finery and fine suits. Real honor is moving; real courage can shoot out the lights. It was a privilege for me personally to see Mukhtar Mai in person, to hear her speak a few careful words through her translator - and to hear her cheered so well and so honestly. Among the honorees and presenters at Avery Fisher Hall were models and musicians and actors; names like Brooke Shields, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Melissa Etheridge, Steven Spielberg, Goldie Hawn, and Venus Williams. Mary J. Blige did a killer version of U2's One. But the night's biggest star was the quietest: in a soft voice she told us her motto: "End oppression with education." Who could disagree?

Coverage/links:

BBC
Associated Press
Donate
delicious tag (previous posts etc.)

UPDATE: CNN 's Andrea Koppel has a behind-the-scenes post on Mukhtar Mai that's very compelling, especially this quote from the subject:

"I have a message to the women of the world and all the women who have been raped or any of the kind of violation: that, no matter what, they must talk about it and they must fight for justice."

Koppel also observed the incredible contrast between Mukhtaran Bibi and the night of stars at Lincoln Center:

She came to receive a Woman of the Year award from Glamour, a magazine she had never heard of.

The contrast could not be more stark: a magazine known for promoting hot bodies and beauty tips honoring a devout Muslim who dresses modestly in a sari and is usually covered head-to-toe. She was introduced by Brooke Shields.

The Far Side of the World

Stone-age attitudes toward women exist on this worthy planet thousands of years after either evolution or intelligent design - or both - banished the age of cave-dwellers to the study of misty and ancient paleology. Men continue to employ humilition and physical domination in organized fashion to subjugate women; to compel by force what they are incapable of compelling by logic or humanity, in and around the darker corners of our shared human habitation. One of these dark corners is rural Pakistan, so recently the focus of world pity for the ravages of a massive earthquake. Many thousands dead. And few roads, fewer conveyances, few routes to bring the wealth of allies like the United States to bear in aid of the broken and starving victims.

That same lack of roadways - the stark absence of modernity so shocking to Americans - has provided a impenetrable haven, as we all know too well, for our nation's greatest sworn enemy - the killer Osama bin Laden. That lamentable dearth also helped to create the setting of one of the most heroic stories of our age: the triumph of Mukhtaran Bibi over the forces of sexual terror.

And even as we strive to relieve those rural provinces, the very incursion of aid will push modernity on the same village elders who sentenced Mukhtar Mai to be gang-raped as the penalty for a family dispute. Expected to take her own life by ignorant men, she chose instead not to yield but to fight - not with weapons or force, but through non-violence, through words, through legal recourse, through the very force of will in her small body. Against the village elders, against the ancient code of the provinces, against the very misogynist actions of her country's strongman President, the anti-woman General Pervez Musharraf, she stood like a rock - loyal to her country, loyal to her people, and most palpably, loyal to her ideals.

After the regime in power relented and returned her rights of transit, Mukhtar Mai is on her way to finally visit the United States to accept an award from Glamour magazine as its Woman of the Year for 2005. The $20,000 prize will no doubt assist greatly in the education of the children in the two schools (one for girls, the other for boys) that Mukhtaran Bibi established in her village to banish ignorance. As well, she will use the trip to ask for contributions to help victims in the earthquake.

No honor was ever more richly deserved.

UPDATE: Mukhtar Mai is in the United States and will accept Glamour's award next week at Lincoln Center. Details on her trip here.

World Watches Mukhtar Mai

Mukhtaran Bibi, the Pakistani civil rights leader and worldwide hero, may be coming the United States after all.  Intrepid Times columnist Nicholas Kristof reports in his forum that Mukhtar Mai has been informed that she will be allowed to travel to the U.S. and elsewhere as part of a speaking tour on women's rights. The gang-rape victim, who opened schools for illiterate villagers with settlement money, has become a major symbol of freedom and courage, spurring governments to protest her treatment, mainstream media to pick up her cause, and bloggers to lead the way in getting the word of her plight to the world.

Earlier this week, Kristof reported "the Pakistani authorities have now told Mukhtaran that she will be allowed to travel to the U.S. on her own, without an escort – but they still haven’t returned her passport." That would be terrific news, but there are apparently no travel plans yet. Also good news was the personal involvement in the case of U.S. Secretary of State Condi Rice who "called the Pakistani foreign minister to tell him to stop beating up on Mukhtaran," according to Kristof. From the State Department briefing:

Secretary Rice spoke with Foreign Minister Kasuri on Thursday. Secretary Rice made it clear that Mrs. Mai was welcome to come the United States at any time and that we were looking to the Government of Pakistan to ensure that she was free to travel whenever she wanted to the United States and that no obstacles would be placed in her way. And we received those assurances.

I applaud Rice's involvement - indeed, it thrills me as an American - and I hope the U.S. government keeps the pressure on. Without support from the Bush Administration, General Musharraf's government simply cannot survive, so the U.S. can clearly have a strong influence on her fate. Clearly, Musharraf realizes he stepped into a public relations disaster.

Only a few weeks ago, outside of those who read Kristof, a handful of journo's in the UK press, the progressive Pakistani media, and a small handful of bloggers, Mukhtaran Bibi was relatively unknown. Now, she's a cause celebre: her story has been featured on network and cable news, on the major news sites, and in syndicated columns around the world. The news services follow her case daily.  Hit Google News or Technorati and the links are legion. [She's also received a bunch of marriage proposals].

This, folks, is distributed media in the cause of civil rights. And it has moved the Pakistani regime to retract many of its early actions, and to come very close to a public apology. [See Musharraf's full statement here]. It has caused her attackers to be re-arrested and prosecuted. It has caused the the world to pay attention. For my blogging pals who took part in this over the last few weeks, a hale and hearty thanks - there are more than 200 of you now and I can no longer keep up with keeping a running list.

I will certainly keep following this story, but in many ways, our job is done: the world is watching Mukhtar Mai.

On Consulate Row

In real estate and realpolitick, location is everything. Strange then that fate (or John Lindsay perhaps) placed the New York consulate of Pakistan on East 65th Street, nearly back-to-back with the (you guessed it) Indian consulate on East 64th Street. Their staffs can easily converse over the back garden fence. One just north of the other; both a half a block in from Fifth Avenue and the Central Park Children's Zoo, near which today a gaggle of earnest New Yorkers rallied to support Pakistani human rights icon Mukhtaran Bibi.

As buses and taxis whisked toward the Plaza, and nannies and strollers and tourists tried to claim a path down the sidewalk next to the park, a coalition of human rights organization sent a stern and strong message to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf: it is patriotic to be a Muslim, a Pakistani, and a woman in support of Ms. Mukhtaran.

"President Musharraf has talked about enlightened moderation," said Amna Buttar, president of the Asian-American Network Against Abuse of Woman, which organized the public press conference. "Well, we are a group of enlightened and moderate Pakistani-Americans."

The groups involved included ANAA, Amnesty International, Turning Point, Human Rights First, and Women in Islam. Two dozen woman held placards with Mukhtar Mai's picture on them up for passersby and the traffic along Fifth Avenue. All of the speakers called on the Pakistani government to allow Ms. Mukhtaran to travel to the U.S. on the tour originally organized by the ANAA.

The speakers were passionate and eloquent, and time and again, they sought to counter the Musharraf argument that promoting the case of Mukhtar Mai is bad for Pakistan and for Islam. Pakistani-American social worker and activist Robina Niaz, founder of Turning Point, a New York-based organization offering services to Muslim women and families facing cultural, religious and other problems, put it best.

"Mukhtar Mai is a role model for all Pakistani women," she said. "Indeed, she is a role model for all women of the world."

No sign they got through, however. According to a new post on Kristof's blog, the Pakistani embassy handed out flyers saying that ANAA is actually an Indian-financed Hindu group of Pakistan-haters. Nice. But then again, location is everything.

Note: I was going to create a montage of the quickie camera pics I snapped with my Treo 650 today, but found that Technorati did it for me (left) by grabbing thumbnails via RSS from Flickr - and with captions. Neat.

Truth to Power

Apart from a test of wills with a military regime in an especially dangerous part of the world, what does the Mukhtaran Bibi story really mean? In his latest update today, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof makes that case that Mukhtar Mai's saga is emblematic of a larger struggle: to end ritual, sadistic, and nearly feudal sexual abuse of women.

And he adds a powerful kicker: the Bush Administration should take the lead in holding allies responsible for human rights abuses. Is this a Jimmy Carter-like call for human rights as American policy, doomed to draw snickers from the Georgetown-living, Cabernet-swilling realpolitickers?

I don't think so, and neither does Kristof. Indeed, if anything's apaprent in a post-9/11 world it is that our deals with the devil come back manifold, that we need to be active and aggressive in changing the world, and that human rights - in the long term - can have a foreign policy impact that will draw us closer to the Muslim world. There's nothing wrong with holding the Administration's feet to the fire, and with holding Mukhtar Mai out as a hero and a symbol, something Kristoff does very well today:

When Pakistan's prime minister visits next month, President Bush will presumably use the occasion to repeat his praise for President Pervez Musharraf as a bold leader "dedicated in the protection of his own people." Then they will sit down and discuss Mr. Bush's plan to sell Pakistan F-16 fighter jets capable of carrying nuclear weapons.

But here's a suggestion: How about the White House dropping word that before the prime minister arrives, he first return the passport of Mukhtaran Bibi, the rape victim turned human-rights campaigner, so that she can visit the United States?

Despite Mr. Bush's praise, General Musharraf shows more commitment to his F-16's than to his people. Now he's paying the price. Visiting New Zealand the last few days, he was battered by questions about why he persecuted a rape victim, forcing him to cancel interviews.

Pakistani newspapers savaged him for harming Pakistan's image. And the blogosphere has taken up Ms. Mukhtaran's case, with more than 100 blogs stirring netizens to send blizzards of e-mails to Pakistani consulates or to join protests planned for Wednesday and Thursday at Pakistani offices in New York and Washington.

Yet it's crucial to remember that Ms. Mukhtaran is only a window into a much larger problem - the neglect by General Musharraf's government of the plight of women and girls.

Did you note the "100 bloggers" reference? That's all of you, and many others whose posts and links I haven't had time to note. Call it a small, wired movement - only in today's world would the plight of a woman from Meerwala, Pakistan reach the eyes and ears of hundreds of thousands of concerned people around the world.

Now, let's put some feet on the pavement.

Tomorrow and the next day the group who planned Mukhtar Mai's trip to the United States - a trip General Musharraf doesn't want her to take - is holding protests against the Pakistani government in New York and Washington. Please turn out. Here's the latest press release:

PRESS CONFERENCE   
June 22, 2003

10:30 a.m – 12:30 p.m.

65th Street, Fifth Ave., New York

A press conference will be held on Wednesday June 22, 2005 at 10:30 a.m at 65th Street and Fifth Ave. in Manhattan.  The press conference is being sponsored by ANAA (Asian American Network Against Abuse of Women), Turning Point for Women and Families NY and Amnesty International, USA.
 
The press conference is being held to urge the Pakistani government to allow Mukhtaran Bibi to travel and speak freely within and outside Pakistan.  Representatives of ANAA, Turning Point, Amnesty International, Human Rights First will address the conference along with other well known rights advocates.         

As has been widely reported in the international media, Mukhtaran Bibi endured the harrowing tragedy of being sentenced to rape by a tribal jirga, maligned by her community and yet emerged courageous and committed to improving the society around her. Tragically, she is now refused the right to speak the truth about her ordeal while all the men who raped Mukhtaran Bibi are now free.

Mukhtaran Bibi was put under house arrest on June 9 only to be spirited away for a day and reproduced at a Press Conference organized by government officials. In the Press Conference she stated that she was foregoing her invitation to the United States to attend the ANAA Symposium on Violence against Women in South Asia.  In the mean time, while Pakistani government officials maintain she is "free to leave", police continue to surround her house and monitor all telephone conversations.  In addition, Mukhtaran Bibi's passport has been taken and is no longer in her possession. Victimized first at the hands of a tribal jirga and gang raped by twelve men, Mukhtaran Bibi has now been made to believe that telling her story and bringing attention to the plight of women like herself would make her "an enemy of Pakistan." 

ANAA is deeply disappointed at the Pakistan Government's efforts to thwart a public advocacy campaign that aims to draw attention to thousands of women in Pakistan who are regularly brutalized that result from a collusion between discriminatory laws, a patriarchal society and an establishment that fails to implement legislative and social reforms that would end the brutalization of women. We call on the Government of Pakistan to immediately ensure that those charged with the brutal crime will not endanger Mukhtaran Bibi or her family and will be brought to justice.

The legal, physical and psychological intimidation Mukhtaran Bibi has faced in recent days as a result of her desire to come to the United States is an example of the extreme lack of value placed on women lives and well being in Pakistan.  It also illustrates the repressive silence imposed on all victims of sexual violence

Together with Amnesty International, Turning Point, community and religious leaders and a range of women's advocacy and human rights organizations, we urge every one to join us in our efforts to ensure the safety of Mukhtaran Bibi and exert pressure on the Government of Pakistan to desist from their pressure tactics on her and her family, including granting Mukhtaran Bibi the freedom to speak and travel.

Let's be there!

[Cross-posted on Huffington]

A Free Woman?

Nicholas Kristof today celebrates the return from government detention to her home of Mukhtaran Bibi, the international hero and human rights symbol from rural Pakistani. If anyone deserves a victory lap, it's Kristof of the Times - who has brilliantly galvanized support worldwide for Ms. Mukhtaran, the victim of a so-called honor rape who turned her terrible plight into a celebrated cause for education and modernity and human rights.

But I suspect it's way too early to exchange high-fives, American style - and reading between the lines of Kristof's NYT column today, looking at the tone, I think he agrees. It's the end of a small skirmish, the beginning of a longer war. Ms. Mukhtaran is back home, but she still cannot travel, her future is still not certain, and the President of her country refuses to answer questions. First, excerpts from Kristoff:

Pakistani officials had just freed Ms. Mukhtaran and returned her to her village. She was exhausted, scared, relieved, giddy and sometimes giggly - and also deeply thankful to all the Pakistanis and Americans who spoke up for her.

"I'm so thankful to everyone that they keep a woman like me in mind," she said fervently. Told that lots of people around the world think she's a hero, she laughed and responded: "God is great. If some people think I'm a hero, it's only because of all those people who give me support."

That is so well said. For those who don't know, Ms. Mukhtaran was herself illiterate. The very schools she opened with her settlement money from the criminal case - schools she also opened to the children of the perpetrators - are teaching Mukhtaran Bibi to read and to write.

Is there a better story of redemption, courage, and leadership in the world?

Kristof continues his criticism of Musharraf (more in a moment on his latest moves) and you can clearly read in his column the limits he is facing in reporting on Ms. Mukhtaran's situation; they are close, he is protecting her. There are things he will not say. Read the tone. The details are slim.

Ms. Mukhtaran says she can't talk about what happened after the government kidnapped her. But this is what seems to have unfolded: In Islamabad, government officials ferociously berated her for being unpatriotic and warned that they could punish her family and friends. In particular, they threatened to have the father of a friend fired from his job.

Fittingly, the government is facing its own pressures. Government officials have denounced Pakistani aid groups for helping Ms. Mukhtaran, and Mr. Musharraf added that they were "as bad as the Islamic extremists." So now the aid groups are threatening to pull out of their partnership with the government.

Mr. Musharraf has helped in the war on terrorism and has managed Pakistan's economy well. But in my last column, I reluctantly concluded that he is "nuts," prompting a debate in Pakistan about whether this diagnosis was insolent or accurate. After Mr. Musharraf's latest remarks, I rest my case.

On Friday, Ms. Mukhtaran told me that one of the prime minister's aides had just called to offer to take her to the United States. It seems Mr. Musharraf wants to defuse the crisis by allowing Ms. Mukhtaran a tightly chaperoned tour of the U.S., controlled every step of her way.

"I said, 'No,' " she said. "I only want to go of my own free will."

Hats off to this incredible woman. President Musharraf may have ousted rivals and overthrown a civilian government, but he has now met his match - a peasant woman with a heart of gold and a will of steel.

Hats off indeed. Meanwhile, President Musharraf has been on a world tour, trying to bring support to his regime. In New Zealand, with the Mukhtaran story sweeping the blogosphere and the UK press (still silent in the U.S., Kristof notwithstanding), Musharraf cancelled two interviews. He's afraid. He's defensive. The free press in the land of the Lord of the Rings was all over the dictator. This in the New Zealand Herald:

Privately, General Musharraf is enraged at how Ms Mai's case has brought infamy to Pakistan. The President even threatened to "slap" a reporter "in the face" for publishing details in an international magazine about Ms Mai's defiance. Officials are desperate to hush up the brutal justice of the tribal hinterlands in Punjab.

And this insanity from Stuff, the online NZ magazine:

General Musharraf said he had done much to improve women's rights, probably more than New Zealand's two women prime ministers, but changes needed to evolve rather than be imposed.

Finally, there was this statement, widely reported, from opposition Green party leadership  in New Zealand (you know, the kind of statement people can make in free, democratic countries):

"Musharraf is all but a dictator, and the Prime Minister will be betraying the Pakistani people if she doesn't speak out strongly against his shocking human rights record during his visit here," Green Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Keith Locke said.

"It is good for New Zealand to have closer relations with Pakistan, but they must be accompanied by plain speaking on human rights.

"The routine torture of political dissidents in Musharraf's prisons has been condemned around the world, including in US State Department reports. Pakistan's Human Rights Commission estimates 5000 cases of police torture a year, including beating, whipping the soles of feet, and administering electric shocks.

"Miss Clark says she will be discussing counter-terrorism with Mr Musharraf. We ask her not to accept excuses from the President that the 'war on terror' justifies the use of force against prisoners and their detention without trial. The truth is that many ordinary Pakistanis have been terrorised by the country's security forces."

Mr Musharraf had also failed to protect women's rights, and our Prime Minister should relay our disquiet, Mr Locke said.

"At least 1500 women are killed in Pakistan each year for 'dishonouring' their families. Rape victims are discouraged from laying a complaint. Women can even be charged for the crimes of family members."

The kicker today is this: nothing on the Sunday morning television shows, nothing on the nightly news, nothing on the big mainstream media sites (except for Kristof). We've moved a nice-sized corner of the blogosphere this week folks, but when does the American media wake up from the Michael Jackson case, the Terry Schiavo case, and the Runaway Bride - and stand up for human rights and women around the world?

And where is President Bush?

Rape and Public Relations

As the BCC's Karachi bureau chief Aamer Ahmed Khan noted in a tough, incisive article yesterday, the Pakistani goverment of General Musharraf faces a public relations nightmare over its detention and intimidation of international human rights hero Mukhtaran Bibi.

He is right. Musharraf's government, established by military coup over a democratically elected administration, has spent five long years attempting to achieve legitimacy on the international scene. Ironically, the attacks of 9/11 helped, because President Bush needed an ally with some muscle next-door to the al Quaeda camps in Afghanistan. Musharraf was at the right place at the right time, and has been embraced as an ally by the U.S. Administration. (For Americans who know little of the region's politics, this is essentially the dominant view of Pakistan). The firestorm over Mukhtar Mai's treatment by Pakistan - led by Nick Kristof at the Times, the British media, and a determined cadre of bloggers - is a real and present threat to Musharraf's prestige in the liberal, western world.

The trouble for Pakistan is this: Musharraf agrees.

That is to say, his government views Mukhtaran Bibi as a public relations problem - her speaking tour of the United States, organized by the ANAA, could only spell trouble for Musharraf. And Musharraf needs support in the State Department, at the White House, and on Capitol Hill. The simple solution was to take Mukhtar Mai into detention, intimidate her into retracting her visa request, and hold her passport indefinately.

But it was also the simpleton's solution in a freely-wired world that can easily route around Musharraf's uniforms and tell Mukhtar Mai's story to anyone with a connection.

Yet the apologists continue their braying about patriotism and PR. Their work in the pro-Musharraf Pakistani media is obvious and really not worth quoting; generally it goes like this: Musharraf is "on Mukhtar Mai's side, this is a Pakistani problem, we are handling it." More troubling are the views of the prominent social critic Dr. Aslam Abdullah, a naturalized U.S. citizen who is editor of the Muslim Observer and director of the Islamic Society of Nevada, Las Vegas, as well as the director of the Muslim Electorates Council of America. Dr. Adbullah's work appears on sites like alt.muslim and Islamicity - sites that are inherently progressive because they allow many differing viewpoints of the modern Islamic world. In a nutshell, this is Dr. Abdullah's view of the case (from Islamicity):

This case exposes an aspect of Pakistan's social reality and must be condemned, but when such cases are selectively exploited by government officials and special interest groups for political purposes, it also exposes a hypocrisy that must also be taken to task.

Ah yes, I can see it now: from his perch in Vegas, Dr. Abdullah is going the "special interest group" route or the well-worn "outside agitators" route used for so long in the old segregationist South. Here's more:

It is not their concern for the victims of rape as their commitment to their own agenda that has brought them in the forefront. If they were serious about her case, they would have allowed the judicial process to take its full course before deciding any action specially in a situation when the highest executive authority of the country himself stood by her and assured the nation that justice shall be done.

By bringing her to the US or to the UN, they were not helping Mukhtaran but promoting their own agendas. What was done to her was inhumane and Un-Islamic? The feudal and tribal system that promotes this kind of action must be challenged because who knows how many Mukhtarans have been living in the agony of harm done to them. By exposing her to a society where there is a growing anti-Islamic environment the activists are primarily serving their agenda to humiliate those who stand for Islam or Pakistan.

What a load of dung. Sure, my agenda is to "humiliate those who stand for Islam or Pakistan." That's clearly Nick Kristof's agenda. And it's the agenda of the 100 bloggers who have sounded the call in Mukhtaran Bibi's defense. Throw in the Guardian, the Independent, and the BBC - all of which have been all over the story. It's the ANAA's agenda, alright. And that of MercyCorps and Amnesty International. And it's surely a goal of the U.S. State Department, which lodged a needed but too-mild (in my view) protest of Ms. Mai's treatment by Pakistan.

Read this well Dr. Abdullah, and you agents of President Musharraf, and everyone else who would see Mukhtaran Bibi and her supporters as just another public relations problem in the cause of power and regional hegemony - as somehow disloyal to state and religion:

It is Mukhtaran Bibi who stands for Pakistan and for Islam. She is clearly a patriot and a Muslim.

UPDATE: The ANAA, which had sponsored Mukhtar Mai's trip, has organized two protest meetings this coming week in New York and in Washington, DC. I will try to attend the New York conference. Please turn out and pass this along. Here is the info:

1. NY PRESS CONFERENCE:

Date: Wednesday, 22nd June 2005
Time: 10:30-12:30 PM
Location: 65th Street, Fifth Ave
New York, NY 10021
Directions by subway: Take the N/R train to Fifth Ave.
Open to Public. Please bring your friends.

2. WASHINGTON DC Protest Rally:

Date: Thursday, 23rd June 2005
Time:12:00-2:00PM
Location: Outside the EMBASSY OF PAKISTAN-WASHINGTON DC
3517 International Court, NW
Washington DC, 20008
Open to Public. Please bring your friends.

Mukhtaran Bibi Speaks

While President Musharraf continues his globe-hopping within the nominal "war on terror" alliance of nations, reviewing the troops of New Zealand yesterday, a real Pakistani hero is back in her Punjab home, still unable to travel on a planned goodwill tour of the United States.

But even as Musharraf travels in his Presidential jet, the word is spreading. Even as he defends his abyssmal record, the word is spreading. Like wildfire, the immoral detention of Mukhtaran Bibi has taken on a media-based life of its own. Musharraf's thugs can take her passport, threaten her lawyers, and place her under house arrest - but in a wired world, ever more connected and free to write, to post, to speak, word is spreading. We're routing around President Musharraf and the military of Pakistan. And Mukhtar Mai's words are spreading.

Today, I listened to an interview via telephone and translator, conducted by reporter Lisa Mullins for The World audio service. Mukhtar Mai refused to discuss her current situation, and was clearly nervous about pushing the government too far. She does, after all, have to live in her country; she is committed to her schools and her province, and to the children who will embrace the modern world. But Mullins was good, and pressed softly; here are some exerpts (some paraphrasing on the questions) - it was very moving:

Your village thought you would kill yourself?

They believe that a woman who has been dishonored like this would be better off dead.

Did you ever consider sucide?

In the beginning, I thought about it, how other girls who go through this kill themselves, but then I thought that the one who gives us life demands life.

What do you think of all the attention you've gotten from people outside of Pakistan who have taken up your cause?

I am very thankful to them. One person alone cannot do this. I am only able to stand up if the whole world is behind me.

Do you feel safe now? Does the international attention make you safer?

The little hope that I've got for justice is because of the support I'm getting from the rest of the world. I think maybe if I get more support from outside of Pakistan, I may get justice.

Nick Kristof's column on Sunday may well shed more light on the situation - he has a longstanding relationship with Mukhtar Mai and has really led the charge in telling her story - but more and more people are getting involved. I think we're up over 70 bloggers signed onto this effort now (I will attempt to keep the list as much as possible). The good folks over at Huffington Post invited me to write something for them and I did (it's here - nothing new, except for the wider audience). The Columbia Journalism Review's Samantha Henig did a very nice story on the blogging effort on Mukhtar Mai's behalf yesterday - please take a look, some of you are mentioned. And last night, this whole thing got a nice pop from CNN on Inside Politics; the transcript is here.

Meanwhile, the Asian-American Network Against Abuse of Women, the organization which was sponsoring Mukhtar Mai's speaking tour, has decided to protest the Pakistani government. It will hold two press conferences - on in DC and one in New York - next week. New York will be June 22 from 10:30 to 12:30,and Washington will be the next day from noon to 2 pm. They are requesting people to sign up in advance via these email addresses: 4anaapk@gmail.com or abbuttar@aol.com - let's get plenty of bloggers and friends away from the keyboards and face to face for a while!

UPDATE: This in from Kristof's forum late this afternoon. The guy has terrific sources and a knack for pointing out official hypocrisy of the highest order:

Today a Pakistani government official I know called me and we had a long talk about Mukhtaran – and about Today a Pakistani government official I know called me and we had a long talk about Mukhtaran – and about Pakistan’s refusal to give me a visa to visit her. This official emphasized that while Pakistan had made mistakes in handling the case, they were by lower officials and that President Musharraf himself was on Mukhtaran’s side.

Half an hour later, I found this wire story from Auckland, New Zealand:

Pakistan President Gen. Pervez Musharraf said Friday that he ordered a travel ban on the victim of a village council-ordered gang rape to protect Pakistan's image abroad.

Musharraf said Mukhtar Mai, whose rape was ordered to punish her family for her brother's alleged affair with a woman from another family, was being taken to the United States by foreign nongovernment organizations "to bad-mouth Pakistan" over the "terrible state" of the nation's women.

"She was told not to go" to the United States to appear on media there to tell her story, Musharraf told the Auckland Foreign Correspondents' Club.

He said NGOs are "Westernized fringe elements" which "are as bad as the Islamic extremists."

Musharraf acknowledged placing the 36-year-old on the list of people banned from leaving Pakistan while responding to media questions during a three-day visit to New Zealand….

Musharraf said atrocities are perpetrated daily against women in developing nations round the world -- "in Kashmir and many other places."

"I don't want to project the bad image of Pakistan," he told the journalists' club.

"I am a realist. Public relations is the most important thing in the world," he said, adding that media misperceptions would discourage tourists from traveling to Pakistan.

"Pakistan is the victim of poor perceptions. The reality is very different," Musharraf said.

He defended his regime's treatment of women, saying it was working for their emancipation. Rape was not "a rampant malaise Pakistan suffers from every day," he said.

Well, where to start? NGOs as "Westernized fringe elements" as bad as extremists? Rape as a "rampant malaise." Public relations as more importan than human life. And "poor perceptions." A disgrace.

Mukhtaran Bibi Update

While this is pretty much the story of one courageous woman and a movement of people to support her, I can't help but to be fascinated by the power of the blogosphere in this saga. Since Tuesday afternoon, we've lined up something on the order of 50 blogs supporting Mukhtaran Bibi, who is being held in Pakistan so as not to embarass the corrupt, failed Musharraf government.

And now, I'm getting email updates from inside Pakistan - where, unfortunately, the news is not good. Despite a soothing statement from the U.S. State Department and one from the Pakistani government, Mukhtaran Mai is not free to travel as of this morning. The liberal Pakistani Daily Times reports that although this hero for our times has has been taken off the government's do not travel list, her passport has been confiscated. Here are the details, and it's clear that we must continue to press this case. So please. continue to use the email addresses of the Pakistani U.S. embassy staff, please write members of Congress and the President (politely, Fitz and Alva), and by all means, get as many blogs as possible involved in this. Other than Nick Kristof, this case has been largely ignored by the pontificating piehole class, and that needs to change. From Pakistan:

“I told the prime minister that the government itself should escort her around instead of her getting into the hands of people who might exploit this case and malign Pakistan’s image abroad,” Ahsan told Daily Times. Daily Times sources said that Mai’s Pakistani handler took her to the US embassy and she requested the embassy to return her passport without a visa. Sources said that government authorities seized her passport, saying the government would facilitate Mai if she wished to travel abroad.

Later, Mai spoke to HRCP chairperson Asma Jehangir, and told her that the prime minister called her on the phone and assured her that if she cooperated with the government and handed over her passport, her name would be removed from the ECL. “The prime minister told me that he would personally ensure that I would be able to go to the US in a month,” she was quoted as telling Asma.

Earlier in the National Assembly, Ahsan said the government was violating basic human rights by keeping Mai in custody and not allowing her to meet her lawyer. “It is the basic human right of every Pakistani to appoint a lawyer of his/her choice,” he said. “I am not concerned about her name being on the ECL. I am concerned that she is my client and she is not being allowed to meet me,” he said. He said Mai was also being forced to change her lawyer. “She wanted to meet me in Lahore and then in Islamabad. But she was unable to contact me as Nilofar Bakhtiar did not allow her,” Aitzaz said.

A few housekeeping notes .... I'll be keeping the list of contributing blogs updated, many links came in over night (updates later today). I'm hoping this network of support can hold together and grow over time. Also, I got a small cultural lesson via email as well. Apparently, my references to "Ms. Bibi" essentially translates to "Miss Miss" in Urdu, thereby injecting some (perhaps much-needed) humor at my expense into this story for the Pakistani community. I'll try and get it right.

UPDATE: Mukhtar Mai's situation is still far from clear. Apparently she is still being barred from travel. Amnesty International is all over this now. Its director, Dr. William F. Schulz, issued this statement:

Amnesty International USA is gravely disappointed by reports that gang-rape survivor Mukhtaran Bibi was pressured into withdrawing her visa application for a speaking tour in the United States. That the Pakistani government would bar Ms. Mukhtaran from leaving the country is a testament to the calculated measures it has taken to obscure a human rights record that flies in the face of international standards.

Ms. Mukhtaran, who late last week was in effect put under house arrest and then disappeared, only to show up a day later at a press conference and state her intent to forego her invitation to the United States, was victimized first by her attackers and again by her recent treatment at the hands of her own government. This same government refused to intervene in her case at the time of her rape until it was shamed into action by international pressure.

Despite lifting the travel ban against Ms. Mukhtaran, the government of Pakistan has yet to clarify its role in the cancellation of her trip to the United States. We call on the government of Pakistan to give a public account of what transpired in the time Ms. Mukhtaran was missing and to recommit to protecting women's rights. We urge the United States government to determine whether pressure was indeed exerted on Ms. Mukhtaran to withdraw her visa request.

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