In DC Reshuffle, Citigroup-er Lew Eyed for Treasury, of Barney Frank, FOIA & Rendition

By Matthew Russell Lee

WASHINGTON, January 9 -- Alongside President Barack Obama's nominations of John Kerry, Chuck Hagel and John Brennan, the post of Treasury Secretary is said to be slated for former Citigroup-er Jack Lew.

  Given Citigroup's role in predatory lending and the global financial meltdown, some are asking how could a senior Citigroup official during the critical time from 2006 through 2008 be considered for Treasury Secretary?

  Others counter-argue that Lew worked for Tip O'Neill, the Speaker of the House from Massachusetts, albeit in 1979.

  Meanwhile, former Congressman from Massachusetts Barney Frank has let it be known he'd like to be appointed as temporary fill-in Senator for John Kerry, nominated instead of Susan Rice to replace Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State.

  One wag suggested, if MoveOn is proposing Paul Krugman to replace (non) tax man Timothy Geithner as Treasury Secretary, why not Barney Frank? Why not Daniel Tarullo?

  Lower down the financial food chain, the name of Nicholas Retsinas has been floated for FHFA. And in anti-Freedom of Information Act news, now that Lisa Jackson who created fake e-mail accounts to evade FOIA has stepped down, should compliance with Government in the Sunshine laws be a criteria for the Environmental Protection Agency and all other top appointments?

  On Chuck Hagel's nomination as Defense Secretary, now Elliot Abrams has been disavowed by his current employer, the Council on Foreign Relations (whose chief, Robert Haas, makes $800,000 a year, it has emerged).

  It's John Brennan's nomination for CIA Director that may face most opposition, on what are diplomatically called enhanced or "unique" interrogation techniques and rendition. Watch this site.

At NYU, Galbraith's Kurdish Oil & Abrams' Contra Conviction Unmentioned

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, April 5 -- With Elliot Abrams slated to debate Peter Galbraith Tuesday on whether America's global wings should be clipped, moderated by ABC's John Donvan for the Intelligence Squared series, certain basic facts were expected to come out.

Elliot Abrams was found guilty -- and later pardoned -- for misleading Congress about Iran - Contra. More recently, Peter Galbraith's financial interest in oil in northern Iraq's Kurdistan region was exposed by the Norwegian and then US press. (Full disclosure: Inner City Press wrote about it, on this site.)

But neither fact was mentioned even when Galbraith, hiding in plain sight, asked why the US hadn't just left Kurdistan alone, since “it was working.” For him, clearly.

This is what happens when you set up a debate between people with similar Achiles Heels. With Mutually Assured Destruction, each debater clips his wings. But where was the moderator? Where was this Intelligence, Squared?

The program for the event, held in NYU's Skirball Center, listed among “Bright” donors Mort Zuckmerman, and among advisors Fareed Zakaria. So where was the journalistic impulse?

Donvan asked the audience for faux applause for rebroadcast on Bloomberg television. Eliot Cohen said his non-clipping side should win because on the other wise would be Kim Jong-il and Hugo Chavez. Lawrence Korb played the churlish accountable to Galbraith's oil man feint. Ultimately the two Elliots won. Truth and full disclosure, however, were each ill served.

All four panelists said they supported US involvement in Libya, though the wing clippers said they agreed that no ground troops should be used. But what about arming the rebels, and Obama (and Cameron's) position that they can, despite the arms embargo in UN Security Council Resolution 1970, even as modified by Resolution 1973? America's wings clipped, indeed....

At UN, W. Sahara Resolution Approved, Exploitative Fishing Continues, Pascoe's Murky Trip

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un3colonies102108.html

UNITED NATIONS, October 21 -- The lingering question of Western Sahara came up for a vote on Tuesday in the UN's Fourth Committee. Inner City Press interviewed two representatives of the Polisario Front. Both expressed moderated satisfaction with the resolution about to be voted on. The key is Operative Paragraph Two, said the first, pointing to a section saying that the General Assembly "strongly supports Security Council Resolution 1754 (2007), by which the Council called upon the parties to enter into negotiations without preconditions... which will provide for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara." He went to say that "the rest is bull [excrememt]."

Morocco, on the other hand, likes the subsequent paragraphs, and pushed for inclusion of such concepts as political realism, which some equate not only with Elliot Abrams but further back with Henry Kissinger -- who incidentally is slated to appear at the UN on October 24, with Hans Blix and others.

The second Polisario representative present at Tuesday's vote, referring to Monday's voting-down of Argentina's language that self-determination must be qualified by any question of sovereignty that may exist, blamed Argentina for not simply making a resolution about the Falklands Island, instead of putting other situations like Western Sahara into jeopardy.

Last week, Inner City Press asked the UN's former envoy to Western Sahara Francesco Batagli about the European Union's agreement with Morocco which the EU claims gives its members permission to fish off the coast of Western Sahara. Batagli said Spain is using the agreement to exploit Western Saharan waters, while Sweden disagreed on these grounds with the EU's agreement with Morocco.

Batagli, who also served in Kosovo, said he left the UN because he was embarrassed. In Western Sahara, he said, the Moroccan flag was allowed to fly over that of the UN. They sent me there without no tools, he said, echoing another UN envoy, to Myanmar

The non-governmental diplomatic service that brought Batagli to the UN told Inner City Press that the UN's Lynn Pascoe was then going to Rabat to try to convince the Moroccan government to accept as Ban's envoy to Western Sahara the American Christopher Ross. Pascoe was seen in the UN on Monday, eating Chinese food. Was his trip to Rabat successful? "Morocco is trying to humiliate Ross," one of the Polisario representatives told Inner City Press.

"Not a good start," Inner City Press commented.

"For whom?" came the response. "For Ross? Or for Morocco?"

While the meeting was to start at 3, at 3:18 the crowd was still milling around. The chairman, Argentine himself, gaveled open the meeting. By 3:24, the resolation had been rubber stamped, and the first speaker began: Jean-Maurice Ripert of France, which actively keep human rights out of the Western Sahara process. Droits de l'homme, mon oeil. The meeting was over by 3:33.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un3colonies102108.html