Lost Justice: Heart Attack in a Paper Snowstorm

Lost Justice: Heart Attack in a Paper Snowstorm

Winter has returned with its cold calculation. The Ohio-based Islamic charity organization, KindHearts, has had its accounts frozen by the Department of the Treasury, while an investigation is done for any possible assistance to Hamas. U.S. citizens are now barred from doing business with KindHearts. Happy Valentines Day!

KindHearts board member Jihad Smaili told the Washington Post, “"We are absolutely surprised and disappointed in the government's action. This conduct by the government is going to be felt immediately by people who need KindHeart's assistance all over the world and in the United States."

Mr. Smaili added that, "I hope they don't use this unfair weapon against us and prevent us even knowing the reason they are doing this or the evidence they have." Note to Bush: If the government does not play fair, relies on secret evidence, then even its responsible actions will been seen as false.

And will the government play fair? Ha! Recent news stories tell how mistakenly shared secret evidence regarding the Holy Land Charity (since closed) has exposed the government case as largely fraudulent; and now, “Holy Land lawyers believe the classified material benefits defendants and raises the possibility that federal surveillance was authorized based on misrepresentations, vague descriptions and fabricated testimony. (Newsday 2/16/06)”

In fact, boxes of legal materials were literally dumped in front of defense lawyers like garbage; "Many documents were not stapled and pages were out of order," defense
lawyers told the judge in a motion. "The government provided no index. In short, it is clear from the condition of the documents and manner of production that the government took no steps to track and record the documents produced and did not perform any quality control."

Amazing, but this is from the administration that also brought us Iraq and Katrina messes. This is the government that cuts back basic services but requests 632 million dollars to promote nuclear technology research, development. This from the government that is planning to spend $700 million for construction or expansion of NSA listening facilities in Augusta, Ga., and Kunia, Hawaii.

This is from the government that wants to re-classify more than 55,000 previously declassified pages, which in theory may place many historians in violation of the Espionage Act. Too much paper! Too many secrets!

And this is from a government that has yet to fund the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board despite being a main recommendation of the 9/11 Commission. "They have stalled in giving the board adequate funding. They have stalled in making appointments," said Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.). "It is apparent they are not taking this seriously."

But they are taking it seriously enough to make sure their friends control it. Proposed board members include former Bush Solicitor General Theodore B. Olson, a right winger whose wife, Barbara, died tragically in the Sept. 11 attacks. Another is Francis X. Taylor, a retired Air Force general and former State Department counter-terrorism coordinator, who is chief security officer at General Electric Co. The board chairwoman is Carol E. Dinkins, a Houston lawyer and Justice Department official in the Reagan administration as well as longtime friend of the Bush family and treasurer of George W. Bush's first campaign for governor of Texas, in 1994, and co-chair of Lawyers for Bush-Cheney, which recruited Republican lawyers to handle legal battles after the November 2004 election. Wow, civil liberties R us! Good friends make good business!

Republicans are known as “pro Big Business.” But though President Bush told the nation in 2001that Holy Land Foundation was among those who "do business with terror," we now see his Homeland Security Czar Chertoff being criticized for “doing business” with a Dubai-based corporation to run many of our nation’s ports.

Chertoff has responded that sometimes business interests need to be balanced against security! But that is at least a moment of honesty; and indeed, some of the backlash against the Dubai group is anti-Arab profiling.

Still, we all should be nervous at the multinationals that would control our lives from ports to our prisons, our print media and our pharmaceuticals. Even if they are a bit more expensive, can local companies be more accountable? Or will they subcontract everything to the undocumented, at least until the next immigration sweep?

The KBR Division of Halliburton now has $365 million for detention facilities in an immigration emergency. This could mean a terror attack; or even the social unrest associated with the Avian Flu! If this or any other disaster happens, God forbid, there will be people who want to link Muslims to it, who see conspiracy theories everywhere. And our community probably will blame the Jews or the CIA, right? Or the Danish? May Allah open our minds!

This is no time for germ warfare. But it is true, avian flu is spreading fast and has been confirmed in Egypt, Germany, Nigeria, Turkey, India and Italy. Indonesia has confirmed that a 19th person had died of bird flu.

Vietnam has begun to successfully fight the disease after killing 5 million chickens and inoculating almost 200 million birds. Authorities in Bulgaria put a man in an isolation chamber yesterday and were testing him for bird flu after two of his ducks died. But will the leaders in the Muslim countries put the right people in the isolation chambers? Or perhaps only the political opposition will enjoy such accommodation? And do these leaders and nations have the will to organize effectively in case of rapid spread of the disease? And in the USA, will FEMA know how to respond?

And so a reminder to my fellow travelers: at ports of entry of travelers arriving from areas affected by avian influenza need to be screened. After your return, monitor your health for 10 days. If you become ill with a fever plus a cough, sore throat, or trouble breathing during this 10-day period, consult a health-care provider. Before you visit a health-care setting, tell the provider if you have had direct contact with poultry or close contact with a severely ill person. May Allah protect you!

Please do not end up a “health risk” as well as “security risk”! No one wants to be isolated for their own good. The infection of fear has spread far and wide; watch out! In a crisis, reactive government policies may be scattershot, shooting wildly when it comes to dangerous aliens, birds, as well as the slower, more vulnerable family members, friends and neighbors, as Dick Cheney’s recent demonstration shows so well.