Month: March 2009

Windsock Steele’s Problem

Before a couple months ago, I probably had most of my exposure to Michael Steele through Bill Maher’s Real Time HBO show. Steele was a frequent guest, often playing the Republican foil to smarter, more successful Democrats (after all, lieutenant governor and failed Senate candidate isn’t much of a resume in the political world). Steele was at times an effective communicator in the panel discussion context because he could disagree without being disagreeable.

That, however, is a real problem with Steele qua RNC Chair. The modern Republican Party is premised on the idea that by being disagreeable with Democrats (notably the highly popular President), moderates and independents will like them. Of course that’s a bat shit crazy premise to work from (and I am totally fine with the GOP using it), but it’s a wrinkle that makes Steele’s tenure as RNC Chair likely to be short to start out with.

The problems he’s had recently of saying whatever it is his interviewer wants to hear stem directly from his desire to be agreeable.  Naturally the GOP response has been to publicly attack him for saying reasonable things that might actually help their party (EG, Limbaugh is an entertainer, abortion is a choice). That Steele is ready to correct himself with every misstep only solidifies the perception that he is a politically weak windsock who will blow whichever way his critics want him to blow.

The Madman

It really shouldn’t surprise anyone anymore that the purveyors and proselytizers of dead tree journalism don’t understand or respect new media. Nonetheless, the brazen way with some journalists and academics show their disdain for the 21st century is startling in its rank stupidity. Yglesias notes that accusations of new media as being “experiments in gadgetry” are “like saying that writing books is an experiment in playing with printing presses.”

Some day there will be a Columbia j-school professor who walks into his class of new students and something like this will happen:

The madman jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes. “Whither is Journalism?” he cries; “I will tell you. We have killed it—you and I. All of us are his murderers.

Until then, wank on professors of journalism at Columbia!

Why Did the State Dept. Edit Comments on Tibet?

Yesterday the State Department put out a brief statement on Tibet, China, and March 10th. It was not in Secretary of State Clinton’s name and it was very timid.

Today, during the State Department’s daily press briefing, spokesman Robert Wood was questioned intensely by reporters about the statement and the process that lead it to being so weak.

QUESTION: Yeah. Robert, yesterday at almost about exactly this time – I think it was 11:05, at least according to the transcript – you came down and said that the Secretary would be issuing a statement about the 50th anniversary of the uprising in Tibet. About eight and a half hours later, a statement was, in fact, released, but it was in your name, not in the Secretary’s name. And I’m wondering if you can explain what happened between 11:05 and 7:38.
MR. WOOD: The statement has the full weight of the Secretary and the State Department behind it. Very simple.

QUESTION: You don’t think that a statement in the Secretary’s name is stronger or sends a stronger signal than –

MR. WOOD: What I’m saying to you is that the statement that we issued last night has the full weight of the Secretary. It was cleared by the Secretary and it represents the Secretary’s views.

QUESTION: Okay. At around the time – in the afternoon, or when this was being cleared, it looks like there was a lot of language removed from the –what I’m told was an original draft. The statement that came out doesn’t make reference to a couple things that I’m told were in the original draft, including stressing access to Tibet, to the region, creating conditions for negotiations between the Dalai Lama’s representatives and the Chinese, releasing prisoners, due process – respect for due process of law, and not criminalizing peaceful dissent. None of these things are specifically mentioned in the statement that came out, and I’m wondering why that is.
MR. WOOD: Well, Matt, I’m not going to talk about internal deliberations that we have with regard to statements, but let me just say that this is a statement that we put out yesterday. It reflects our policy. As I’ve said, once again, the Secretary’s full weight was behind the statement, and that’s where we stand.
QUESTION: How would you address criticism from people who – in the human rights community that this is really kind of allowing the Chinese – giving the Chinese a free ride on this?

MR. WOOD: I don’t believe it’s giving the Chinese a free ride on anything. I think we have said time and time again from this podium – you’ve heard it from previous secretaries of state, you’ve heard it from previous presidents – that we are very concerned about the situation in Tibet. We encourage the Chinese to improve the situation on the ground in Tibet. We will continue to do that. That statement that was issued yesterday evening reflects the State Department’s views about the situation. And once again, I just want to be very clear about this: This is a statement that was cleared by the Secretary, has the full weight of the State Department behind it.

It was disappointing to see Secretary of State Clinton not speak out on behalf of freedom, human rights, and the Tibetan people yesterday. It’s disappointing and quite troubling to see that the State Department dramatically walked back their plans in the course of a few hours, presumably under strong pressure from China.  The State Department has not only dodged an opportunity to be a voice for human rights and freedom — something the House of Representatives is again choosing to be on this issue — but actually dodged substantive, important questions about how US-Tibetan policy is being influenced on a day by day basis.

Congress has long been a leader in speaking out for Tibet and the Tibetan people. It’s time the State Department and Secretary of State Clinton step up and at bare minimum match the words and actions of Congress. Of course real leadership would mean dramaticaly charting a course forward that included recognizing that human rights cannot be separated from our dealings with China.

More March 10th Media Coverage

Here’s another great Al Jazeera clip from yesterday. In the video are SFT’s deputy director Tenzin Dorjee and SFT Board member Yangchen Lhamo, who deals with some especially tough questions. Yangchen also delivers one of the clearest explanations of how the contemporary Tibetan independence movement has used non-violence in the response to Chinese brutality, as well as an explanation for what advocates for independence like Students for a Free Tibet see as Tibet’s future post-independence.

In Canada, the Globe & Mail has a forceful editorial criticizing China’s anti-Tibetan rhetoric around March 10th. It’s one of the hardest hits I’ve seen the Western press make against the Chinese propaganda machine on behalf of Tibet:

China’s Xinhua news agency responded to the statements with a story saying that, after the rebellion five decades ago failed, China carried out the “long-delayed emancipation of millions of serfs and slaves in Tibet.” The report also describes China’s efforts to modernize Tibet by citing road-building statistics. But if everything is so rosy for Tibet, then how come Chinese authorities have the country under lockdown, with independent journalists and human-rights observers barred from travelling there? Amnesty International this week condemned continuing human rights violations carried out against the general Tibetan population, including arbitrary arrests and prolonged detentions of peaceful protesters and other prisoners of conscience, as well as torture.

Chinese officials have prepared a white paper that pretends that all protest in Tibet is stirred up by Western anti-China forces. This is comical in light of the flaccid response by Western governments to China’s misrule in Tibet and their failure to support Tibetans’ fight for autonomous status for their nation – a status that even China pretends to observe.

Despite all of this, including his strong statements of yesterday, the Dalai Lama said he and the government-in-exile remain committed to what he termed the “path of truth and non-violence” in dealing with the Chinese government. If only China’s masters were so enlightened.

The New York Times also has an editorial which encourages the Chinese government to hold meaningful negotiations with the Dalai Lama.

50th Anniversary of the Tibetan National Uprising

I spent yesterday lobbying Congress on Tibet in my capacity as a Board member of Students for a Free Tibet and as a supporter of Tibetan freedom and rights. With me were about 150 Tibetans and supporters, meeting with House and Senate offices from across the country. It was a powerful statement of the involvement of the Tibetan exile community in American politics and the embrace of American democracy by Tibetan immigrants, while still looking for an end to China’s military occupation of Tibet.

Today – March 10th, 2009 – marks the 50th anniversary of the Tibetan national uprising, which began in Lhasa and provided the opportunity for the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government to escape the Chinese military and relocate to India.  China first invaded Tibet in 1949. By 1959 there was a tense atmosphere, marked by armed resistance in many parts of Tibet. The Chinese military completely occupied Lhasa. Reports broke that the Chinese were going to attack the Dalai Lama, so hundreds of thousands of Tibetans surrounded the Dalai Lama’s summer palace, the Norbulinka. The Chinese military proceeded to bomb and shell it, as well as the Potala Palace, the Dalai Lama’s main residence in Lhasa. In secrecy, the Dalai Lama was able to escape. The Chinese were not aware of his absence for over two weeks.

The following 50 years of Chinese military occupation have resulted in the death of 1.2 million Tibetans, the destruction of nearly all of the religious institutions in Tibet, population transfer of ethnic Han Chinese to the point that Tibetans are a minority in their own country,  and the rape of one of the most important ecosystems in the world. Despite these drastic offenses, the Tibetan spirit and desire for freedom has not been extinguished. In the last year we have witnessed massive, passionate, peaceful protests across Tibet. These have not been limited to the small area defined by the Chinese government as Tibet, but stand out as a clear demarcation of the real borders of Tibet, as they stood more than 60 years ago.

China has turned Tibet, an area that makes up a quarter of their landmass and about the size of Western Europe, into the world’s largest prison. Cell phones are offline between March 10th and April 1st, an effort by the government to shut down Tibetans’ ability to communicate with each other and with the outside world. The internet inside Tibet is blocked. Foreign journalists are not allowed inside any part of Tibet. Foreign tourists have been banned from Tibet for over a month. In short, the only way information can get out of Tibet is by Tibetans who put their lives on the line to communicate with the outside world, often on lines of communication that are being monitored by Chinese security.

With all this going on, it’s not shocking that the Dalai Lama’s March 10th statement is a step forward in terms of his rhetoric and his willingness to not pull punches when describing the current situation.

Having occupied Tibet, the Chinese Communist government carried out a series of repressive and violent campaigns that have included “democratic” reform, class struggle, communes, the Cultural Revolution, the imposition of martial law, and more recently the patriotic re-education and the strike hard campaigns. These thrust Tibetans into such depths of suffering and hardship that they literally experienced hell on earth….

These 50 years have brought untold suffering and destruction to the land and people of Tibet. Even today, Tibetans in Tibet live in constant fear and the Chinese authorities remain constantly suspicious of them. Today, the religion, culture, language and identity, which successive generations of Tibetans have considered more precious than their lives, are nearing extinction; in short, the Tibetan people are regarded like criminals deserving to be put to death….

If Chinese leaders had any objections to our proposals, they could have provided reasons for them and suggested alternatives for our consideration, but they did not. I am disappointed that the Chinese authorities have not responded appropriately to our sincere efforts to implement the principle of meaningful national regional autonomy for all Tibetans, as set forth in the constitution of the People’s Republic of China.

Lhadon Tethong writes about this March 10th on Tibet Will Be Free, providing a much better contextualization of what’s really happening and how Tibetans are responding.

I am constantly moved by the incredible support that Tibetans receive from people of conscience all over the world. If it were up to the people, Tibet would have been freed a long time ago.

And, in times like these, when Tibetans inside Tibet are being so viciously terrorized by the Chinese authorities, global solidarity actions are like a light in the darkness – giving us all the morale boost we need to keep moving forward.

Already today, hundreds of people held an emotional rally at the Chinese embassy in Canberra while monks across Japan held prayer ceremonies and vigils for Tibetans suffering under Chinese rule. And Tibet Initiative Deutschland in Germany reported that 996 mayors will raise the Tibetan flag. They said last year the number was 922. This year, 11 dropped out due to Chinese government pressure but 85 new ones joined.

I’ll have more updates throughout the day.

Tyranny and brutality will not win out. After fifty years of occupation, it’s time for the Chinese government to recognize that no amount of suffering will force Tibetans to cease in the desire for their birth right of a free nation and human rights. The time to end the occupation is now.

CT-SEN: Dodd/Simmons Tied, Dodd Job Ratings Up Big

While there is going to be a lot of breathless blogging by the Right today on a poll that shows former Rep. Rob Simmons leading Senator Chris Dodd 43-42 in a Quinnipiac Poll, I think this is probably more important:

Dodd, whose approval ratings were in the negative range on Feb. 10, have rebounded slightly. Connecticut voters approve 49 to 44 percent of the job Dodd is doing compared to the 41 to 48 percent approval rating he received on Feb. 10.

The head to head shows a statistical tie with Simmons, which is obviously not good news for Dodd. But Dodd moving +12 in one month in job approval is more important 20 months out. Job approval is relevant. I don’t know how this move can be described as “slight.”

If you want to pull something relevant from the head to head with Simmons, it’s that Dodd is getting killed by Simmons among independents:

In a 2010 Dodd-Simmons match up, Democrats back Dodd 74 to 15 percent while Simmons leads 80 to 10 percent amongst Republicans and 49 to 32 percent among independent voters.

This is pretty much how we should be looking at numbers in these polls, per how we look at these numbers with every other Senate incumbent in America. Last month’s Q-Poll was either an outlier for Dodd’s approval numbers, or Dodd has done phenomenal work in the last month to repair his image in state, despite rabid attacks by Kevin Rennie and the GOP in Connecticut. I can’t make a judgment as to how to read that based solely on the top line release, but either situation reflects much better on Dodd’s chances for reelection than Simmons’ chances for beating Dodd.

Moreover, Dodd is way ahead of other possible challengers.

Sen. Dodd leads State Sen. Sam Caligiuri 47 – 34 percent and tops CNBC-TV host Larry Kudlow 46 – 34 percent, the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll finds.

As counter intuitive as it sounds, I think this poll is good news. All the focus has been and should remain on job approval until there are actual candidates in the race. Dodd has moved back close to the 50% mark for job approval, a standard benchmark for incumbent reelection chances. If he has another good month, he can get back over 50%. I like his chances for reelection significantly better with his approval at or above 50%, regardless of what this head to head with Simmons says. He’s also not going to be threatened by Caligiuri or Kudlow, which should make his job easier in that he can focus on one opponent at a time.

It’s still 20 months from the 2010 Connecticut Senate election and anyone making pronouncements about an impending defeat for Chris Dodd are not thinking honestly about this race. No doubt Dodd is going to be one of the top targets for Republicans in 2010, perhaps the only incumbent Democrat who will face a serious challenge. Republican bloggers and the NRSC are already gunning for him. But Dodd being a target doesn’t mean we get to misread polls or go breathless in anticipation of Simmons beating him. Or rather, I encourage Republicans to presume this race is done for because Simmons has a 1% edge in a poll with a 2.8% margin of error twenty months ahead of the election as Dodd’s job approval ratings are climbing double digits. Be my guest. But I’m going to take this poll, look at the rising job approval and say that maybe Chris Dodd will have to campaign a lot harder than in 2004, but I’m not ready to hand this seat to Rob Simmons by a long shot.

Disclosure: I was proud to work on Chris Dodd’s presidential campaign, but I no longer work for Senator Dodd.