|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Institute for Public Accuracy
|
|
|
|
Another Gulf of Tonkin Resolution?
Because We Embrace Freedom?
|
|
|
WASHINGTON
- September 13 - FRANCIS BOYLE,
fboyle@law.uiuc.edu
Professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law, Boyle said
today: "According to the facts in the public record so far, this was not
an act of war and NATO Article 5 does not apply. President Bush has
automatically escalated this national tragedy into something it is not in order
to justify a massive military attack abroad and an apparent crackdown on civil
liberties at home. We see shades of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, which the
Johnson administration used to provide dubious legal cover for massive
escalation of the Vietnam War."
MATT ROTHSCHILD,
mattr@progressive.org, www.progressive.org
Editor of The Progressive magazine, Rothschild said today: "President Bush said that
America was targeted 'because we embrace freedom.' Not knowing with any
certainty who the attackers were, it's hard to speculate on their motives. But
many groups in the Third World have grievances that are more specific than the
ones Bush mentioned.... The Pearl Harbor analogy has frightening connotations.
Two months after Japan's surprise attack, the U.S. government rounded up
Japanese Americans into internment camps. Now it seems highly improbable that
Arab Americans or Muslim Americans will be rounded up, but what does seem quite
possible is that the media's obsessive focus on a non-differentiated Islamic
fundamentalism -- mixed in with nativist sentiment that is always on the shelf
-- will create a cocktail of hate crimes."
RANIA MASRI,
rania@nc.rr.com, www.peace-action.org
A national board member of Peace Action, Masri said today: "In Raleigh, N.C. -- where I
live -- the local mosque received two bomb threats the day of the attack. The
Islamic School in Raleigh had to close -- due to fear for its students' safety.
People driving by the mosque have been spewing racist statements -- such as
'sand niggers go home' and 'death to you all.' Several Arab women wearing Hijab
had stones thrown at them from passing cars, and have been spat on at the main
university campus. In pockets across the U.S. and Canada, the verbal threats
have become direct physical assaults."
DAVID COLE,
cole@law.georgetown.edu
Professor of law at the Georgetown University Law Center, Cole said today: "In the past we
have responded to acts of terrorism by clamping down on basic civil liberties,
by anti-immigrant actions, and by engaging in unjustified and widespread guilt
by association.
LARRY BIRNS,
coha@coha.org, www.coha.org
Director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, Birns said today: "The Senate is ducking
its responsibility in today's pro forma confirmation hearings on John
Negroponte as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. No public witnesses
are being heard. While the Bush administration has professedly become an
apostle of democracy, it has selected one of the most tainted figures of the
Central American wars of the 1980s to be its ambassador to the UN."
RYME KATKHOUDA,
wbaiinexile@yahoo.com, www.wbix.org
A correspondent with WBIX, which is producing community internet radio in Manhattan, Katkhouda witnessed the collapse of the World Trade Center towers.
###
|
|
|
Common Dreams NewsCenter is a non-profit news service
providing breaking news and views for the Progressive Community.
The
press release posted here has been provided to Common Dreams NewsWire by
one of the many progressive organizations who make up America's Progressive Community.
If
you wish to comment on this press release or would like more information,
please contact the organization directly.
*all times Eastern US (GMT-5:00)
Making News?
Read our Guidelines
for Submitting News Releases
© Copyright
1997-2003 Common Dreams.
www.commondreams.org
|
|
