UPDATED: Obama: On Bended Knee To The Saudis

I'll defer to others much better versed than I am in the vagaries of international politics to offer a more informed analysis, but the recent deference of the U.S. toward Saudi Arabia warrants a closer look. Despite, or perhaps because of, an unfortunate recent characterization by Barack Obama of the repressive Middle East kingdom as free riders eager to drag others into the region's sectarian conflicts, he has made a 'mea culpa trip there to soothe over tensions.

But why the apparent deference? The obvious answer involves the Saudis' massive oil deposits as well as their strategic location, but another issue has arisen in which the American president is acting as a hindrance to those 9/11 survivors who want to sue Saudi Arabia:



As you can see, a real fear is the Saudis' threat to liquidate $750 billion in American holdings. That fear has likely prompted this deferential visit by an American president. Better, it seems, to deny your citizens justice than to face an economic upheaval.

The argument that Obama gives for trying to impede the bipartisan bill that would allow citizens to sue the Saudi Arabian government seems weak to me. He claims it could open the floodgates to other countries suing the U.S., but as far as I know, there is nothing to prevent such action now. The following report probably offers the most realistic assessment of the sorry situation:



The Saudis have consistently received special and deferential treatment from the U.S. Some will recall that shortly after 9/11, when all air traffic in the U.S. was grounded, a group of Saudis, including relatives of bin Laden, was whisked back to their kingdom. And as indicated in the above video, now it is trying to keep classified 28 pages of a congressional report into the attack.

Vox says this:

In 2002, shortly after a Joint Congressional Inquiry into the 9/11 attacks concluded its report, the Bush administration ordered that the inquiry permanently seal a 28-page section that investigated possible Saudi government links to the attack. It has remained sealed ever since.

Some members of Congress who have read the report, but are barred from revealing its contents, describe it as potentially damning. An unnamed member of Congress told the New Yorker, "The real question is whether it was sanctioned at the royal-family level or beneath that, and whether these leads were followed through."

"The 28 pages primarily relate to who financed 9/11, and they point a very strong finger at Saudi Arabia as being the principal financier," former Sen. Bob Graham, who is leading the charge to release the document, said in February.

It is an unwarranted protection of Saudi interests that must end, according to Andrew C. McCarthy, who, as described in a Wikipedia entry, led

the 1995 terrorism prosecution against Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and eleven others. The defendants were convicted of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and planning a series of attacks against New York City landmarks.[4] He also contributed to the prosecutions of terrorists who bombed US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. He resigned from the Justice Department in 2003.

Says McCarthy,

it is long, long past time — for the United States government to come clean with the American people, and with the families of Americans slaughtered on 9/11 by 19 jihadists, 15 of them Saudis. The government must disclose the 28 pages of the 2002 congressional report on the 9/11 attacks that it has shamefully withheld from the public for 14 years. Those pages outline Saudi complicity in the jihad.

It is nothing short of disgraceful that the Bush and Obama administrations, relying on the president’s constitutional authority over foreign intelligence and the conduct of foreign affairs, have concealed these materials.

Injustice frequently prevails in our fractured world. Despite all of the public clamour, I somehow doubt anything will soon change for those victims of terrorism currently seeking redress.

UPDATE: Thanks to Alison for providing this link:

Award-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh talked in a wide-ranging interview with journalist Ken Klipperstein about the complex relationship between the United States, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, which he reported on extensively in his new book, The Killing of Osama Bin Laden.

Among other things, Hersh said in the exclusive AlterNet interview that the Saudi government bribed Pakistan with “hush money” to hide Osama bin Laden from the U.S. because the Saudis didn’t want the Americans to interrogate him.

“The money was from the government … what the Saudis were doing, so I’ve been told, by reasonable people (I haven’t written this) is that they were also passing along tankers of oil for the Pakistanis to resell. That’s really a lot of money,” Hersh told Klipperstein.

The bribe, in the form of money and tankers of oil, was in the amount of “hundreds of millions [of dollars],” but he didn’t have solid figures to share.

As well, be sure to check out Alison's post on the history of Canada's cozy arms-dealing relationship with Saudi Arabia.

No Simple Solutions

Over the years, I have learned to be wary of those who promise simple solutions or argue issues within a black and white framework. People who embrace, for example, Donald Trump's promises to 'bring jobs back to America' without asking the key question, 'How?' are acting like those religious fundamentalists who accept The Bible as literal truth. Similarly, when a particularly contentious issue arises in public policy, to reflexively embrace or reject it based on personal values, beliefs or ideologies is to negate the crucial role that critical thinking must play in informed and effective policy formulation.

Such, I believe, is happening in the assisted-suicide legislation introduced by the Liberal government. It is, admittedly, very cautious and conservative legislation:

The government’s proposal is more restrictive than some proponents of legal assisted suicide had sought. It does not include provisions for minors who may be capable of making decisions about their own medical care to choose to end their lives, nor does it allow for people in the early stages of illnesses like dementia to request an assisted death while they are still competent.

As The Star's Tim Harper points out, this compromise legislation satisfies few:

It created a void that is rapidly being filled by progressives who are understandably upset that the rights of those suffering grievously from mental illness, mature minors, or those who wish to provide advance directives have not been respected in this legislation, providing two tiers of those who are eligible to die with dignity.

It also left enough holes in the legislation for conservative opponents, in this case, many of Canada’s churches, to exploit concerns from their perspective.

In other words, almost no one seems satisfied with the proposal as it stands, including many Liberal senators, who want a bill that grants far greater accessibility.

But I am satisfied with the bill as it now stands.

I have given the issue a lot of thought, and although my position is perhaps no more valid than that of others who have devoted similar time to considering the notion of assisted death, allow me to state my view, for whatever it is worth.

First, I am totally in favour of the right to choose death for those who have terminal conditions and are facing a great deal of suffering as their disease progresses. ALS is one of the cruel diseases that comes to mind. Without any effective treatment or symptomatic relief, its terminal stages are terrible to even contemplate.

That said, I am also in favour of the very cautious approach evident in the proposed legislation. I have surprised myself by also being in agreement at this point not to allow those in the early stages of dementia to request assisted suicide after their disease has progressed.

This position, which I have come to after much thought, is not the one I thought I would hold.

I suspect that the majority of us fear dementia more than almost anything else. I certainly do, and for a long time I agreed with the notion that it would be good to be able to prearrange one's exit from a hopeless situation. However, two experiences, upon reflection, have altered my view and caused me to ask a fundamental question: Whose interests are really being served by allowing a dignified demise to the demented?

My mother suffered from dementia for the last five years of her life. Additionally, due to protracted stays in the hospital, she developed gangrene, first in one leg and then the other, both requiring amputation. During her full-blown dementia, which seemed to manifest itself with her first hospital stay for a broken hip, she was quite delusional, never really aware, it seemed to me, of her actual situation. Objectively speaking, by most people's standards, she had little quality of life - bedridden, confused, a mere shell of who she had been.

Yet she was sufficiently aware, until the last few months of her life, to know us whenever we visited her, and I like to think that those visits brought her some pleasure. Although she had been having earlier memory problems, my mother's abrupt transition into dementia seems to have also protected her from any awareness that would have produced profound suffering. If anything, she seemed always to be in good cheer.

Unlike my mother, my mother-in-law was aware that she was developing dementia, something she had always feared. Her descent was gradual, as is usually the case. It caused her some distress for a time as she realized what she was losing. Yet again, after being in assisted living and eventually a nursing home, as her disease progressed, she no longer seemed in distress, as her awareness of what was happening decreased to the point where it was ultimately non-existent. Again, I can't say that she was suffering, except perhaps due to what she once told me was her discomfort over 'communal living.'

Eventually, at some level, my mother-in-law decided it was time to die; she no longer ate, and drank very little. Quite rightfully, the family respected her wishes and allowed her a dignified exit without imposing a feeding tube, etc. to keep her alive. It was the right choice.

So I now return to my earlier question about whose interests are being served by allowing a dignified demise to those suffering from dementia. As my two examples suggest, it is not necessarily for the one suffering such a terrible fate. Could it not, at least in some cases, be for those loved ones who are distressed to see a parent, husband, wife, brother or sister in such a broken state, assuming theirs are lives no longer worth living?

My point in writing this is a simple one: while currently in our right minds, we may indeed feel that it would be best to prearrange our assisted death to avoid a protracted and undesirable demise. However, can we really know what we will feel like once the acute awareness stage of early dementia passes? If we cannot answer that question with any degree of certainty, it is best, I believe, to err on the side of caution, as the Trudeau government is currently doing.

Play The New Liberal Game

I believe it is called bloodshed for dollars.

I'm Just A Poor Boy, Nobody Loves Me

That famous line from Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody might have been the inspiration, and is certainly the subtext, for James Forcillo and his lawyer's pleas that poor baby James be allowed to serve whatever sentence is passed down to the killer of Sammy Yatim as house arrest.

The officer’s acquittal on a charge of second-degree murder means his use of lethal force was justified and the mandatory minimum penalty he faces is grossly disproportionate to his conduct, his lawyers argue in written submissions filed in Ontario Superior Court.

“The moral culpability of the applicant [Constable Forcillo] is at the lowest end that can be reasonably contemplated for an attempted murder conviction and there was no attendant harm to Mr. Yatim,” writes lead defence lawyer Peter Brauti.

In analyzing the verdict and the actions of Constable Forcillo, his lawyers maintain that it is not appropriate to impose a prison sentence. “The logical and legal effect of the jury’s verdict is that they accepted it was reasonable and necessary to kill Mr. Yatim,” states Mr. Brauti. “The second volley did not accelerate death in any way; it had no meaningful impact on Mr. Yatim’s health and it was incapable of causing Mr. Yatim any pain,” he adds.

Constable Forcillo’s lawyers also intend to appeal the actual verdict, but can not do so until after the sentencing.

Incidentally, unless he goes to jail, I assume Forcillo will continue drawing his police salary, as he is now.

Since I started with Queen lyrics, I'll end with them too, again from Bohemian Rhapsody:

Essy come, easy go, will you let me go?
Bismillah! No, we will not let you go. (Let him go!)
Bismillah! We will not let you go. (Let him go!)
Bismillah! We will not let you go. (Let me go!)
Will not let you go. (Let me go!)
Never, never let you go
Never let me go, oh.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Oh, mama mia, mama mia (Mama mia, let me go.)

Come to think of it, the entire song seems applicable to Forcillo:

Not An Obsession

Looking at the sidebar that lists the tags on my blog posts, I see I have written well over 100 entries on the police, most of them dealing with their abuse of authority; some of those abuses include the murder of unarmed or barely armed people, others the senseless beating of people. All of them attest to a constabulary, whether Canadian or American, out of control and contemptuous of any efforts to bring them to accountability of justice.

Some might say I am obsessed with the topic, but they would be wrong. What I think I am obsessed with is the desire for fairness and justice and an utter and complete contempt for those who abuse their power and authority.

Here in Ontario, that abuse is rampant, and true accountability is rare. The responsibility for such a sad state of affairs resides largely with the provincial government.

Governments seem loathe to incur the ill-will of those sworn to protect and serve us. With their 'us against them mentality,' the police have proven to be formidable forces to fear when politicians and other prominent people incur their wrath.

Legislators are failing us, and it has to change.

Consider, for example, the secrecy that surrounds SIU investigations of police actions. When their investigations are complete and they exonerate, as they almost always do, police officers who have either beaten, shot or killed a person, the public is not allowed to know the basis for exoneration, the names of the officers involved, or anything else that might provide an inkling of how the investigatory body reached its conclusion. What I didn't know until the other day is that such secrecy is not mandated under the Police Services Act.

As revealed in The Star,

the report prepared by the director of the SIU, the agency that probes deaths, serious injuries and allegations of sexual assault involving police in Ontario, goes straight to the desk of the Attorney General — and nowhere else.

The Police Services Act, the law that governs the SIU, says the watchdog’s director must report the results of investigations to the Attorney General. It doesn’t state the reports cannot be sent elsewhere or made public.

So what is stopping a wider release of SIU reports?

The spokesperson for Attorney General Madeleine Meilleur [says] the reports contain information protected under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, “including information relating to affected persons (e.g. persons seriously injured), witnesses and officers under investigation.”

According to Brian Beamish, Ontario’s Information and Privacy Commissioner, this is a bit of an evasion:

“While the name of a police officer who has been the subject of an investigation by the Special Investigations Unit (SIU) would likely be personal information, there may be circumstances of significant public interest where the SIU may disclose the name or other information associated with its completed investigations for the purposes of fostering accountability and public confidence in police services, and ensuring transparency in its operations,” Beamish told the Star in a statement.

While public consultations will soon be announced by the Wynne government into Ontario's police oversight mechanisms, there really is nothing that exists in current legislation to either encourage or prevent much greater public accountability and scrutiny right now.

The bright light of public scrutiny is something the police themselves seem to fear, and while our political 'leaders' allow themselves to be bullied by our public 'protectors,' horrible situations like the killing of Rodrigo Gonzalez at the hands of police will continue:



Clearly, the dire situation demands strong, unambiguous and immediate remediation.

Andrea's Damascene Moment

In the Book of Luke, Jesus is reported to have said the following:

I tell you that ... there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.

In Acts of the Apostles, Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus is described:

As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. 4 He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”

5 “Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked.

“I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. 6 “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”

The pure of heart might indeed feel that those passages resonate when contemplating Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath's recent conversion to the belief that the minimum wage should be $15 per hour, latching on to a movement that has been gaining a great deal of traction over the past few years.

The more cynical might be inclined to see Ms. Horwath's new stance as rank political opportunism. Consider, for example, how she felt about such matters just two years ago:

"Well, look, I respect the work of the grassroots movements that have been calling for the $14 minimum wage, but I think that what our role is right now is to consult with families that are affected, as well as small business particularly that’s also affected”.

At about the same time, Ms Horwath was calling for the Ontario minimum raise to rise only to $12 per hour in 2016.

Apparently, however, she has some people fooled by her newfound allegiance to the working poor, as is evident from this Star reader's letter:

Raise the minimum wage, Letter April 11

At a recent speech for the Broadbent Institute, Andrea Horwath publicly demonstrated that her party has finally seen the light on a $15 living wage.

Her announcement is all the more noteworthy in a week when the North American Fight For $15 campaign had some rather momentous victories south of the border.

Governor Jerry Brown stared down the powerful business lobby within his own California Democratic Party to sign into law a path to $15 per hour. In New York Governor Andrew Cuomo stood up to Wall Street fear-mongering and signed the Empire State’s own $15 minimum wage law.

So the question for Ontarians, in a week awash in reforms and revelations, is whether any other party leader in Ontario will stand up to Bay Street bullies and bring Ontario standards into the 21st century by finally ending the shameful institution of government sanctioned working poverty.

If we can trade carbon with California can’t we also trade good ideas or will Ontario, California beat our Ontario to $15?

Mike Vorobej, Ottawa

I have never been a member of a political party. Perhaps if the day ever comes when I detect a leader acting out of principle and integrity instead of rank political expediency, I may join one.

A Powerful Statement

And one that needs no words: