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In last week's column, we reviewed Bush's first cabinet appointments, which, for Muslims, was a case of mixed signals.
In particular, we saw the appointment of Colin Powell to Secretary of State as a step in the right direction after the agony of Madelyn Albright's one-sided senior political staff, while the appointment of John Ashcroft as Attorney General did not bode well for the civil liberties of Muslims in America.
Condoleeza Rice’s appointment remains a question mark, and others that Bush has made are giving mixed signals.
On the plus side, Bush has appointed Mitch Daniels, an Arab-American, as director of the Office of Management and Budget. While Daniels is not a Muslim, the fact is that, like Muslims, Christian Arabs are vilified in America, and Bush's willingness to appoint an Arab-American in the face of that prejudice bodes well the relations of his administration with this community.
Another plus is the appointment of Rod Paige, hitherto Houston School Superintendent, as Secretary of Education. Paige is yet another African-American nominee to the cabinet, and has a strong record of favoring the types of educational reform that would benefit Muslims. Education was the one issue on which Bush had a significantly stronger position that Gore, and this appointment suggests that he intends to stand by that position. Of course, it is Congress, the Courts, and state legislatures, not the Secretary of Education, who determine whether or not the government supports alternative forms of education, but Paige’s appointment holds out the hope that Bush will also appoint Supreme Court justices who are favorable towards school choices.
I would argue that Tommy Thompson is also a positive appointment. Thompson has pioneered efforts for welfare reform, and his record in Wisconsin has proven that it is possible to end the cycle of dependency that has channeled so many Americans into a culture of poverty. Although welfare reform has its opponents – largely, the bureaucrats and politicians who benefit from the existing system – many welfare recipients would prefer to get jobs rather than handouts. In any case, the recognition that faith-based organizations are in a better position to deal with the in-depth circumstances and needs underlying poverty than an impersonal bureaucratic state is a development that Muslims should welcome.
Gale Norton, the first woman ever appointed to the position of Secretary of the Interior, may or may not be good choice. Environmentalists have criticized her for being in the mold of James Watt, Reagan's Interior Secretary. There is no doubt that Norton has a strong commitment to protecting private property, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. On the contrary, the fact that private property is jealously protected by its owners is often beneficial.
For example, it is well-established that privately owned forests, even when harvested for wood, are better managed in order to promote their long term productivity than government owned forests. Government owned lands, when harvested, have been subjected to such atrocious practices as clear-cutting. When not harvested, they have been excessively subjected to problems like forest fires because of poor management.
If Norton will guide the Interior department into a new paradigm in which trusteeship of private property is one of the tools used to protect the environment, her appointment will be a good one. If, on the other hand, she shares James Watt's millennial views from Christian fundamentalism, we have cause to worry. After all, why protect the environment if the world is going to end soon?
However, these are still not the major reasons that I consider some of Bush’s appointments as creating mixed signals. It is because of his appointment of Donald Rumsfeld to the critical post of Secretary of Defense, which I believe raises a red flag. While we cannot be certain that he will continue the hostile policies of past American administrations toward the Muslim world, it is a fact that many conservatives greeted the appointment of this former Cold War warrior with glee – precisely, because they saw in it the hope that his influence on the Bush administration would negate Powell’s.
Powell, as his record shows, has the cautious attitude towards military force that is characteristic of any good military officer. A good commander will be prudent about the application of military force to solve problems when he knows that the lives of his troops are at stake. However, civilian commanders sometimes have a glorified view of war, and play down the down side.
Behind Rumsfeld's benign concern about civil control over military authority lurks the specter of military decisions being driven by political considerations. It is a fact with which Muslims must come to grips that the Zionists have been assiduously courting cold-warrior types with the mantra that Islam has replaced the Soviet Union as the new threat to a free world. Whether or not Rumsfeld will succumb to this siren song has yet to be seen.
The fact that Rumsfeld was a part of the political establishment that in the past sacrificed both the democratic hopes of the Muslim world and the long-term interests of America for short-term stability and the sake of its "special relationship with Israel" should be a source of concern to not only Muslim-Americans, but to all Americans who feel that America's foreign policy must be grounded in the long-term best interests of the American people.
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