4 - TheMichiganDaily-_Friday,September_17,_2004
OPINION
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JASON Z. PESICK
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NOTABLE
QUOTABLE
You deserve a
president ... who
will not ignore his
own intelligence
while living in a
fantasy world of
spin."
- Sen. John Kerry ,at a campaign speech to
a group of National Guard veterans in Las
Vegas, as reported yesterday by CNN.com.
SAM BUTLER T
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Oil for lives: the Sudan crisis
JASMINE CLAIR THE niIEANINC, OF PROGRES.
mergency! Geno-
cide alert! An
entire civilian pop-
ulation is being massa-
cred. Defenseless women
are being raped and slain.
A generation of inno-
cent babies, many now
orphans, are being mur-
dered. Men are being cas-
trated. Villages have been
set ablaze and bombed. More than one million
have fled for their lives in hope of safety, only
to encounter famine, disease, malnutrition and
more death. This is what is taking place in the
Darfur region of Sudan right now. Perpetuated
by a militia group known as the Janjaweed, a
group of nomadic Arab herdsmen sponsored
by the Arab government of Sudan, the violence
is aimed toward suppressing the rebellious
sentiments of a population of African farm-
ers. In the month of September alone, 10,000
more of these African civilians will lose their
lives. Yet, nations across the globe are delay-
ing their efforts to condemn these occurrences
and bring peace and stability to the region.
Due to the oil industry in Sudan, it remains
doubtful that the United Nations will impose
any type of economic sanction on the Suda-
nese government. Countries such as China,
Pakistan and Russia, which exploit Sudan's
320,000-barrel-a-day oil industry, are voicing
strong objections to any U.N. action that could
potentially jeopardize Sudan's ability to export
oil. Hence, after finally becoming a known
international crisis, countries will knowingly
pay for their oil at the expense of thousands
of Sudanese lives. Fortunately, the Clinton
administration severed oil ties with Sudan in
1997 after finding that they were housing such
terrorists as the infamous Osama bin Laden. If
not, America may have also been one of these
countries sacrificing humanity for oil.
Perhaps we need to bring the Bush admin-
istration to the University for a history les-
son on what happens when the United States
and the United Nations take passive action
against genocides. It seems as though they
have forgotten about the recent events in
Rwanda and the Balkans, both examples of
genocide, in which the U.S. administration
delayed its response, costing hundreds of
thousands of lives. Specifically in Rwanda,
the United Nations lacked sufficient power
to protect civilians. In the Balkans, the world
stumbled over ignorance as it tried to figure
out why ethnic cleansing was taking place.
Meanwhile, thousands more died.
President Clinton expressed deep regret for
his failure to respond promptly on both occa-
sions. Under the Bush administration, this
lane of memories is being revisited. Howev-
er, the bloodshed of the '90s was not enough
to remind Bush about the consequences of
delayed action. After visiting Sudan and wit-
nessing first hand the great number of rapes
and killings that were taking place, Secretary
of State Colin Powell took well over a month
after his visit to declare that genocide has now
persisted for over 18 months. Despite knowing
that the death toll is rising very quickly, U.S.
action will remain limited to American dollars
and attempts at diplomacy.
Money is nice. It feeds the starving and
shelters the homeless. But what good is
money to the mother trying to awaken her
dead baby, or to the man staring at his sev-
ered genitalia on the ground before him?
The violence must be stopped. Monetary
aid is needed, but will not end this civil war.
Powell also advocated allowing the African
Union to "monitor" the region. Translated:
More spectators will be invited. When did
genocide become a spectator sport? How
many more people have to die before this
crisis is adequately addressed?
Admitting that diplomacy often fails,
Senator Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), chairman
of the Foreign Relations Committee, stated
that the United States could not get involved
militarily because it gives the Arab commu-
nity reason to believe that the United States
is deliberately waging war against it. Appar-
ently, the senator ignored the memos tell-
ing him that "the United States is currently
occupying a country with a 75 percent Arab
population (Iraq) in a war termed "the war
on terror." Perhaps what the senator should
have said was that America will only make
humanitarian efforts to fight hostile Arab
states when our oil is at stake.
The Sudan crisis continues to be the most
obvious and pressing display of human
rights violations in occurrence today. Tak-
ing action should not be a question of eco-
nomics, ethnicity or partisanship. This is
not an issue of one's support for Bush or
allegiance to this nation. This is a matter
of humanity crying out to the world and as
a country that proclaims its liberties, mor-
als and values all across the globe, Amer-
ica has a moral imperative to respond. If
we can derail dictators simply because we
don't want to be their friends anymore, the
United States can do more than send aid and
diluted U.N. resolutions to end genocide.
America is strong, but what use is strength
if it can't protect the weak? And as the lone
superpower, what good is power if it can't
be used to defend the powerless?
a
6
Clair can be reached at
jclair@umich.edu.
Sourcing outsourcing
SAM SINGER SA Cs U
n typical pre-elec- issue was so eagerly politicized? Think about prompt more efficient capital reallocation. Take
tion-time fashion, the it, the logic is consistent, evidence seemingly Delta. After the airline exported 1,000 call cen-
pulse of the national watertight and the impact - well, the impact is ter jobs to India in 2003, a new $ 25 million sav-
economy has been wired heartrending. With a little help from the media, ings cushion allowed the company to add 1,200
to a hypersensitive polit- the outsourcing debate has been transformed new reservation and sales positions in domestic
ical heart-rate monitor. into a saga of the modern-day labor struggle - a locations.
The slightest fluctuation Michael Moore documentary waiting to happen. What about the manufacturing sector? Dem-
of the Dow, a bounce Spearheading the campaign is CNN com- ocratic Party leaders can't seem to remind us
in the Consumer Price mentator and self-proclaimed guardian of enough of manufacturing's abysmal employ-
Index, a marginal hike the working class, Lou Dobbs. In his nightly ment outlook. But were those jobs simply dis-
in crude oil futures - any economic hiccup "Exporting America" diatribes, Dobbs tells placed overseas with a tacit wink and nod from
- can immediately become partisan mortar a poignant story of social dislocation at the Bush? An Alliance Capital Management study
fire for the field guns of both contending par- hands of a free-trade-happy White House. says no. According to its findings, between
ties. And with disconcerting growth reports In a typical segment, Lou will fume over the 1995 and 2002, the U.S. manufacturing wit-
streaming from Washington and whispers unemployment rate and the "jobless recovery," nessed an 11 percent decrease in employment
on Wall Street of a monetary slowdown, the share an upsetting anecdote about a middle levels. In the same span of time (and here's the
president has begun receiving his share of the class family now void of a primary source of kicker), the report found that the global share of
shelling. income, then run a brief clip of a Dell call cen- manufacturing employment rates suffered an
For closing his eyes to a pending transfer ter in India to shore up his case. In spite of his identical 11 percent falloff - a rather damn-
payment crisis, allegedly neglecting Social earnest demeanor, swaying rhetoric, and com- ing piece of data for any outsourcing adversary.
Security and other pension programs in lieu pelling reasoning, there is one concept Lou But wait, it gets better. While factory workers
of more immediate discretionary spending, never fails to overlook - causality. across the globe were scampering for sever-
he has been called shortsighted. For his part Though Dobbs and his big-labor allies would ance pay, productivity levels were skyrocketing
in accumulating what is in nominal terms the like you to believe otherwise, outsourcing and (the same seven-year period saw a 30 percent
largest budget deficit in this nation's history, he high domestic unemployment figures are two increase in global output).
has been called a fiscal loose cannon. And for ships that passed in the night decades ago. In You see Lou, your enemy was never the
his short term stimulus package, a consumer- the two sectors most vulnerable to competition president's free trade agenda, or the globalized
friendly bundle of tax relief initiatives and from foreign labor markets, manufacturing labor market, it was technological innovation.
interest rate cuts, he has been labeled an eco- and information technology, the numbers do Productivity growth, Lou, not outsourcing,
nomic chiropractor - accused of squeezing all the talking. holds the bulk of culpability for the plant clos-
the budget in order to bring fleeting reprieve By the most alarming of estimates, over the ings and overcrowded unemployment offices
before November. next decade, U.S. corporations will send an you so love to document. The next time you
But of all the inside-the-Beltway name call- annual 220,000 IT jobs offshore. Sounds scary attack outsourcing, Lou, be upfront - tell 'em
ing, no single disparagement has spilled more right? Sure, until put in the context of a 130- what you're really condemning: a firm's ability
presidential blood than the Left's most fre- million-strong labor market. And when you to efficiently allocate labor and capital, a com-
quently launched pseudonym - the "insensi- account for the Labor Department's projected pany's capacity to shed uncompetitive sectors
tive outsourcer." You've heard it everywhere. internal generation of 22 million jobs in the next in order to generate further profit, a perpetu-
From the Sunday morning talk shows to the five years and an additional four million to be ally expanding and productive economy - the
John Kerry stump speeches, President Bush is insourced, Lou's horror stories start to become tenets of global capitalism.
sending jobs overseas by the thousands, and less frightening. Those numbers also don't con-
middle-class America is paying the cost. sider outsourcing's positive effects on corporate Singer can be reached at
But does it really come as a surprise that this profit margins - revenue windfalls that usually singers@umich.edu.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
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