One of the more curious aspects of Faleomavaega's career has been his devotion to issues
involving Kazahkstan, a central Asian country he has visited numerous times. Central Asian
countries have never been under the legislative jurisdiction of the Asia-Pacific subcomittee on
which he serves and which he chaired from 2007 to this January. The mutual love relationship
has been so great that the Kazakh government once even took out an advertisement in the
Washington Post to sing Faleomavaega's praises. Now it may be coming more clear.
The Project on Government Oversight (POGO) is a thirty-year-old nonpartisan, independent, watchdog that champions good government reforms. POGO, which, according to its mission statement, investigates "corruption, misconduct, and conflicts of interest achieve a more effective, accountable, open, and ethical federal government," has turned its attention to Kazahkstan's cozy relations with members of Congress.
The POGO investigation has uncovered circumstantial evidence that strongly supports some claims that the Kazakh Embassy has used lobbyists to create two separate caucuses dedicated to supporting its interests: the Friends of Kazakhstan caucus and the Caucus on Central Asia. Employees from the lobbying firms hired to create the most recent caucus—the Caucus on Central Asia—have donated thousands of dollars to every member that has served in a leadership capacity of that caucus.
According to POGO: "One Member of Congress, Delegate Eni Faleomavaega from American Samoa, a co-chair and driving force behind the creation of the Central Asia caucus, particularly stands out. In the 2010 election cycle, two of Faleomavaega’s top organizational contributors had been under contract with the Republic of Kazakhstan: Employees and family members from Policy Impact Communications, the lobbying firm hired to create the Central Asia caucus, contributed $4,800, making the firm Faleomavaega’s second largest organizational contributor; and another firm, Steptoe and Johnson, which is the Republic of Kazakhstan’s outside counsel, contributed $2,000 through its Political Action Committee."
Faleomavaega long has been the subject of criticism by his opponents for relying on big contributors with Asian names living in California and labor unions with no activities in American Samoa for the lion's share of his campaign budgets. A few maximum contributions from these special interests will buy a lot of election day plate lunches for voters. He always seems to be able to tap these same sources time and again for all the money he needs to ward off stiff challenges. His supporters insist donors with Asian names are legal contributors interested in his work on the Foreign Affairs Committee, with some having interest on his position on tuna boats built in Taiwan whose owners want access to the South Pacific through American Samoa. He switched his position recently to oppose the legislative change necessary to clear the way for the boats so it will be interesting to see what contributors drop off his list this next campaign.
Meanwhile, there is no telling where the POGO investigation is going. The full details of the scandal can be read here: http://pogoblog.typepad.com/pogo/2011/06/kazakhstan-family-feud-engtagles-members-of-congress.html. One thing is almost certain: don't hold your breath waiting for Samoa News, where Faleomavaega's sister-in-law is an editor, to report on this issue. Expect this to be swept under the rug the way they have minimized almost every controversy involving Faleomavaega over the years.
Showing posts with label Taiwan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Taiwan. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Faleomavaega attacks Japanese leader; decries vestige of imperialism
At a March 17 hearing of his own Asia-Pacific subcommittee called to examine U.S.-Japan relations, Chairman Faleomavaega in his opening statement attacked Japan Prime Minister Hatayama for his “financial scandals and uneven leadership,” which he says are among the reasons his popularity has deteriorated steeply since his election last year. So unpopular is Hatoyama that “only one-quarter of voters say they plan to cast their ballots for the party in July’s Upper House elections,” asserted the combative chairman.
He also recalled that the Ryukyu Islands, of which Okinawa is a part, was once a sovereign kingdom that was annexed by Japan and remains a vestige of Japanese imperialism. He also said Okinawans “face discrimination throughout Japan.” During a visit to Tokyo in January, Faleomavaega said the wishes of the Okinawan people should be given priority in deciding the dispute over the future of the U.S. military presence on the island.
Here is the relevant text of Faleomavaega’s statement:
The burdens the Okinawan people have shouldered on behalf of the alliance should not be underestimated. With less than one percent of Japan’s land area, Okinawa is host to two-thirds of the American forces based in the country. We should also remember that Okinawa, once the sovereign Ryuku [sic] Kingdom, was forcibly annexed by Japan in 1872, and that during the Battle of Okinawa, one-third of its inhabitants died. To this day, Okinawa remains a vestige of imperialism as it languishes behind the rest of the country economically and educationally, and its people face discrimination throughout the [sic] Japan.
In dealing with the Futenma relocation issue, we must not neglect this history. Politically, we must also recognize that Prime Minister Hatoyama’s approval ratings have deteriorated steeply from almost 80 percent when he took office to 30-40 percent now, largely as a result of financial scandals and uneven leadership. Even worse for the DPJ, only one-quarter of voters say they plan to cast their ballots for the party in July’s Upper House elections.
After Faleomavaega finishes liberating West Papua from its Indonesian oppressors, one wonders if he plans to turn his attention north to pry the poor, subjugated Okinawans away from their Japanese masters.
Meanwhile, Congress is on Easter recess and most House members have returned to their Congressional Districts to explain what Obamacare will mean for their voters. Not Eni, of course. He contented himself with issuing a press release, which Samoa News dutifully ran, and headed off to Taiwan to meet with President Ma, who has just concluded a six-nation swing of the South Pacific. So far, no mention of this trip in Samoa News, where his sister-in-law serves as an editor.
He also recalled that the Ryukyu Islands, of which Okinawa is a part, was once a sovereign kingdom that was annexed by Japan and remains a vestige of Japanese imperialism. He also said Okinawans “face discrimination throughout Japan.” During a visit to Tokyo in January, Faleomavaega said the wishes of the Okinawan people should be given priority in deciding the dispute over the future of the U.S. military presence on the island.
Here is the relevant text of Faleomavaega’s statement:
The burdens the Okinawan people have shouldered on behalf of the alliance should not be underestimated. With less than one percent of Japan’s land area, Okinawa is host to two-thirds of the American forces based in the country. We should also remember that Okinawa, once the sovereign Ryuku [sic] Kingdom, was forcibly annexed by Japan in 1872, and that during the Battle of Okinawa, one-third of its inhabitants died. To this day, Okinawa remains a vestige of imperialism as it languishes behind the rest of the country economically and educationally, and its people face discrimination throughout the [sic] Japan.
In dealing with the Futenma relocation issue, we must not neglect this history. Politically, we must also recognize that Prime Minister Hatoyama’s approval ratings have deteriorated steeply from almost 80 percent when he took office to 30-40 percent now, largely as a result of financial scandals and uneven leadership. Even worse for the DPJ, only one-quarter of voters say they plan to cast their ballots for the party in July’s Upper House elections.
After Faleomavaega finishes liberating West Papua from its Indonesian oppressors, one wonders if he plans to turn his attention north to pry the poor, subjugated Okinawans away from their Japanese masters.
Meanwhile, Congress is on Easter recess and most House members have returned to their Congressional Districts to explain what Obamacare will mean for their voters. Not Eni, of course. He contented himself with issuing a press release, which Samoa News dutifully ran, and headed off to Taiwan to meet with President Ma, who has just concluded a six-nation swing of the South Pacific. So far, no mention of this trip in Samoa News, where his sister-in-law serves as an editor.
Monday, February 1, 2010
Faleomavaega Escapes Local Scrutiny Again
The hands of Lisa Williams must be raw from all the high fives she gets from other staff when the local media lets her boss Faleomavaega skate out of yet more difficulty in trying to explain how American Samoa will fare under national policies being considered. Williams, who is Faleomavaega’s chief press aide, also is his chief of staff, top legislative assistant and, with her six-figure salary partly paid by the Foreign Affairs Committee, his chief foreign policy adviser as well. Some say she performs other services for Faleomavaega as well but that’s a story for another day.
Since Faleomavaega gets mainly positive coverage in the local media in American Samoa, you would have to say Williams well earns her hefty salary. But you would have to consider that it isn’t a fair fight in the first place. American Samoa has two newspapers. One is more of a community newspaper that comes out three times a week and does not have the resources to do much more than run his press releases. The larger, daily, newspaper, Samoa News, is an Associated Press affiliate and does have the resources but it, too, contents itself largely with running Faleomavaega’s releases. He is also helped by the fact that his sister-in-law is one of the paper’s editors.
The single television station is government-owned and has an evening newscast that largely ignores the delegate. Only one of the local radio stations has a local news operation. It, too, pretty much runs his releases. Another station gives the delegate an hour each week for a show with content of his own choosing, so a sitting member of Congress could hardly have a sweeter deal than that. No wonder Williams has the time to do multiple jobs at once. She hardly has to break a sweat in dealing with the local press and, somewhat surprisingly, no one in the national press has paid much attention to Faleomavaega, even though fewer than 8,000 people every two years have made it possible for him to rise in Congress to the point at which he now is only two heartbeats away from chairing the House Foreign Affairs Committee. That would make him ostensibly a key shaper of American Foreign Policy, as frightening as that thought would be.
However, as Faleomavaega has demonstrated over an over again, he is no team player and has a foreign policy of his own, even if no one can figure out what it is. Consistency has never been his strongest suit. So, even though he is a protege of the late Rep. Phil Burton, the same San Francisco congressman who mentored Nancy Pelosi and George Miller, it is unlikely they will ever put the House’s foreign affairs machinery into his unstable hands. Evidence? Pelosi took a delegation to China last year to discuss climate change but did not include Eni, even though his subcommittee has jurisdiction over China and global environmental issues. She also did not put him on her massive delegation to Copenhagen for international global warming talks.
If anything, Faleomavaega’s foreign policy seems to be pro-dictator. He famously toasted Ho Chi Minh in Hanoi a couple of years ago on one of his multiple trip to Vietnam and in January this year he helped the local Cambodia Communists celebrate the annual observance of the Vietnam communists’ invasion of Cambodia to topple the Pol Pot government. That gesture was so controversial that the other members of his delegation diplomatically absented themselves from the occasion.
He is so loved in Kazakhstan that the dictator there (who also held the job as a Communist during Soviet times) even took out an advertisement in the Washington Post to praise one of his several visits to the central Asian country. He also has turned in recent years from being a friend of Taiwan to being an ardent backer of the regime in Beijing and--in a demonstration it is not just communists he adores--he has become the chief defender of Fiji’s military dictatorship, in the process condemning (and alienating) Australia and New Zealand. He has no fans in Jakarta because of his attempts to force Indonesia to give up its West Papua province, they are not wild about him in Ankara because of his stance on Armenian genocide and Tokyo is not pleased about his demands that Japan compensate World War II Korean sex slaves.
But how much of all this do the people know about in American Samoa? None. Unless he puts it in a press release, the local media will not touch it. And the voters cheer him on even if members of his own party in Washington wish he would just go away. There always are hopes because his health has been in general decline for years and at age 67 he can’t hope to go on much longer. He can hardly walk, has had major heart surgery and is seriously overweight. His travel schedule is so brutal, that he can be seen nodding off to sleep in congressional hearings on occasions when he is passing through Washington.
One occasion in Washington he never misses is the annual State of the Union address. Viewers always know he is there because he is one of those members who shows up in the House chamber hours early on the day of the speech so he can assure himself a seat on the aisle the president comes down as he makes his way to the podium. That way he can shake hands with the president and be seen on television. Except this year.
Adorned with his trademark bolo tie (the only member of the House who does not regularly wear a standard necktie--not even those members with Indian blood wear the bolo), he could be seen this year sitting next to his freshman colleague from the Northern Marianas on a separate aisle. Perhaps he wanted some distance after having blasted Obama last week for not ordering Secretary of State to hold a summit with island leaders while she was in the region.
So, how did he escape local scrutiny again? Well, at the State of Union, Obama asked Congress to impose a three-year spending freeze on all discretionary domestic programs. The story of the speech was carried in Samoa News but buried in the paper and no attempt was made to tie the request to the local situation. A freeze would be significant if not fatal to the local economy because Faleomavaega is asking for a $25 million subsidy to offset mandated wage hikes which threaten to force the remaining cannery to pull out. In fact, the canner has asked for only a three-month extension of its tax exemption rather than a year as they await word on what Congress is willing to provide.
Not a word out of anyone as to what effect the spending freeze would have on Eni’s $25 million request. And there is no evidence Samoa News took the simple and logical step of asking him, either by phone or by e-mail or through Lisa Williams, what the freeze would mean. Not a word in the paper. Not a single word.
So, today Obama has sent a budget request to Congress for the fiscal year that begins October 1 (fiscal year 2011). It is in the amount of 3.8 trillion dollars. Now that the budget has been made public, the various agencies can talk about their programs. If not to Faleomavaega (who may be traveling), Samoa News could make a simple call to the director of the Office of Insular Affairs at Interior, a Samoan, or to the desk officer, also a Samoan, or to the director of OIA’s budget office to ask “how much has been included to fund Faleomavaega’s tiny request of $25 million?” That’s $25,000,000 out of a budget of $3.8 trillion. Not billion, but trillion!
Don’t hold your breath. Most likely Samoa News and the radio station will wait for his press handout in which he will brag once again how he helped prevent the budget cutters from whacking away at the $23 million subsidy it provides the local government for its operations and $10 million for capital improvements, even though those amounts have stayed at the same level the whole time he has been in office while the population has doubled. Lisa Williams can pull last year’s release out of the file, update it, send it off to Pago Pago and high five the staff again as she lights up her victory cigar.
We are betting there is NO money in the Interior budget for Faleomavaega’s little scheme, which should once and for all convince all doubters that his bill is going nowhere at all. Perhaps his attack on Clinton and Obama last week was meant to give him an excuse for not delivering: retaliation by Obama for him “standing up for the little guy.”
Stay tuned.
Since Faleomavaega gets mainly positive coverage in the local media in American Samoa, you would have to say Williams well earns her hefty salary. But you would have to consider that it isn’t a fair fight in the first place. American Samoa has two newspapers. One is more of a community newspaper that comes out three times a week and does not have the resources to do much more than run his press releases. The larger, daily, newspaper, Samoa News, is an Associated Press affiliate and does have the resources but it, too, contents itself largely with running Faleomavaega’s releases. He is also helped by the fact that his sister-in-law is one of the paper’s editors.
The single television station is government-owned and has an evening newscast that largely ignores the delegate. Only one of the local radio stations has a local news operation. It, too, pretty much runs his releases. Another station gives the delegate an hour each week for a show with content of his own choosing, so a sitting member of Congress could hardly have a sweeter deal than that. No wonder Williams has the time to do multiple jobs at once. She hardly has to break a sweat in dealing with the local press and, somewhat surprisingly, no one in the national press has paid much attention to Faleomavaega, even though fewer than 8,000 people every two years have made it possible for him to rise in Congress to the point at which he now is only two heartbeats away from chairing the House Foreign Affairs Committee. That would make him ostensibly a key shaper of American Foreign Policy, as frightening as that thought would be.
However, as Faleomavaega has demonstrated over an over again, he is no team player and has a foreign policy of his own, even if no one can figure out what it is. Consistency has never been his strongest suit. So, even though he is a protege of the late Rep. Phil Burton, the same San Francisco congressman who mentored Nancy Pelosi and George Miller, it is unlikely they will ever put the House’s foreign affairs machinery into his unstable hands. Evidence? Pelosi took a delegation to China last year to discuss climate change but did not include Eni, even though his subcommittee has jurisdiction over China and global environmental issues. She also did not put him on her massive delegation to Copenhagen for international global warming talks.
If anything, Faleomavaega’s foreign policy seems to be pro-dictator. He famously toasted Ho Chi Minh in Hanoi a couple of years ago on one of his multiple trip to Vietnam and in January this year he helped the local Cambodia Communists celebrate the annual observance of the Vietnam communists’ invasion of Cambodia to topple the Pol Pot government. That gesture was so controversial that the other members of his delegation diplomatically absented themselves from the occasion.
He is so loved in Kazakhstan that the dictator there (who also held the job as a Communist during Soviet times) even took out an advertisement in the Washington Post to praise one of his several visits to the central Asian country. He also has turned in recent years from being a friend of Taiwan to being an ardent backer of the regime in Beijing and--in a demonstration it is not just communists he adores--he has become the chief defender of Fiji’s military dictatorship, in the process condemning (and alienating) Australia and New Zealand. He has no fans in Jakarta because of his attempts to force Indonesia to give up its West Papua province, they are not wild about him in Ankara because of his stance on Armenian genocide and Tokyo is not pleased about his demands that Japan compensate World War II Korean sex slaves.
But how much of all this do the people know about in American Samoa? None. Unless he puts it in a press release, the local media will not touch it. And the voters cheer him on even if members of his own party in Washington wish he would just go away. There always are hopes because his health has been in general decline for years and at age 67 he can’t hope to go on much longer. He can hardly walk, has had major heart surgery and is seriously overweight. His travel schedule is so brutal, that he can be seen nodding off to sleep in congressional hearings on occasions when he is passing through Washington.
One occasion in Washington he never misses is the annual State of the Union address. Viewers always know he is there because he is one of those members who shows up in the House chamber hours early on the day of the speech so he can assure himself a seat on the aisle the president comes down as he makes his way to the podium. That way he can shake hands with the president and be seen on television. Except this year.
Adorned with his trademark bolo tie (the only member of the House who does not regularly wear a standard necktie--not even those members with Indian blood wear the bolo), he could be seen this year sitting next to his freshman colleague from the Northern Marianas on a separate aisle. Perhaps he wanted some distance after having blasted Obama last week for not ordering Secretary of State to hold a summit with island leaders while she was in the region.
So, how did he escape local scrutiny again? Well, at the State of Union, Obama asked Congress to impose a three-year spending freeze on all discretionary domestic programs. The story of the speech was carried in Samoa News but buried in the paper and no attempt was made to tie the request to the local situation. A freeze would be significant if not fatal to the local economy because Faleomavaega is asking for a $25 million subsidy to offset mandated wage hikes which threaten to force the remaining cannery to pull out. In fact, the canner has asked for only a three-month extension of its tax exemption rather than a year as they await word on what Congress is willing to provide.
Not a word out of anyone as to what effect the spending freeze would have on Eni’s $25 million request. And there is no evidence Samoa News took the simple and logical step of asking him, either by phone or by e-mail or through Lisa Williams, what the freeze would mean. Not a word in the paper. Not a single word.
So, today Obama has sent a budget request to Congress for the fiscal year that begins October 1 (fiscal year 2011). It is in the amount of 3.8 trillion dollars. Now that the budget has been made public, the various agencies can talk about their programs. If not to Faleomavaega (who may be traveling), Samoa News could make a simple call to the director of the Office of Insular Affairs at Interior, a Samoan, or to the desk officer, also a Samoan, or to the director of OIA’s budget office to ask “how much has been included to fund Faleomavaega’s tiny request of $25 million?” That’s $25,000,000 out of a budget of $3.8 trillion. Not billion, but trillion!
Don’t hold your breath. Most likely Samoa News and the radio station will wait for his press handout in which he will brag once again how he helped prevent the budget cutters from whacking away at the $23 million subsidy it provides the local government for its operations and $10 million for capital improvements, even though those amounts have stayed at the same level the whole time he has been in office while the population has doubled. Lisa Williams can pull last year’s release out of the file, update it, send it off to Pago Pago and high five the staff again as she lights up her victory cigar.
We are betting there is NO money in the Interior budget for Faleomavaega’s little scheme, which should once and for all convince all doubters that his bill is going nowhere at all. Perhaps his attack on Clinton and Obama last week was meant to give him an excuse for not delivering: retaliation by Obama for him “standing up for the little guy.”
Stay tuned.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
CPPA Denounces Faleomavaega for Laos Visit
The Center for Public Policy Analysis ( CPPA ) in Washington, D.C., and a coalition of dozens of Laotian and Hmong organizations today issued an international communiqué denouncing American Samoa Congressional Delegate Eni Faleomavaega's statements, along with those of the other two Members of Congress who recently visited a government model show-camp in Laos and declared that there were no human rights violations against Hmong refugees forcibly returned from Thailand to Laos.
According to CPPA, over 8,000 Lao Hmong refugees who fled political and religious persecution in Laos were forced by the Thai and Lao military back to Laos from 2007-2009. Between Christmas and the New Year holiday, over 4,700 Lao Hmong refugees were forced back to Laos. Most of the refugees have been imprisoned in Laos’ secret network of jails and camps in remote provinces. Australia journalists from “The Age” recently sought access to one such secret camp where many Hmong refugees were held behind razor wire in squalid conditions. The Australian journalists were arrested and their cameras reportedly seized; they were expelled.
Laos, under the Hanoi-backed communist Lao Peoples Democratic Republic (LPDR), is one of the most corrupt, says CPPA, and oppressive regimes in the world according to a recent public sector corruption and press freedom indexes issued by the respected non-governmental organizations Transparency International (TI) and Reporters Without Borders (JSF). Laos is listed at the bottom of these indexes along with its allies in North Korea, Burma and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV).
The following is taken from the text of the joint international communiqué issued by the CPPA and a coalition of Laotian and Hmong organizations:
“We are deeply saddened by, and must denounce in the strongest terms, the deplorable, distorted and misleading comments of the three U.S. Congressmen, Joseph Cao, Mike Honda and Eni Faleomavaega, during their recent visit to Laos, and to the Lao government's Potemkin Village show camp at Pha Lak in Vientiane Province. Tragically, the U.S. Congressmen have helped to cover-up and whitewash the horrific crimes of the Lao government against the Laotian and Hmong people and refugees who were brutally forced back from Thailand in recent years by the Thai and Lao military,” the International Communique stated.
“It is important to note that Pha Lak village houses only a fraction of the Hmong refugees returned to Laos in previous years as well as many dozens of Lao government informants and undercover agents. It is a tightly-controlled, Lao government camp upgraded for foreign visitors and administered in cooperation with the LPDR Ministry of Propaganda.
“The Lao government and military continue to attack and kill unarmed Laotian and Hmong people. Congressmen Joseph Cao, Mike Honda and Eni Faleomavaega, at their press conference in Vientiane and upon their return to the Washington, D.C., have remained silent on the horrific human rights violations, persecution, atrocities and war crimes that have been inflicted on the Laotian and Hmong people in recent months and years, including the arrest of over 300 peaceful protest marchers in November of last year that prompted a resolution that was passed by the European Parliament that was passed on Thanksgiving Day, November 26.
“We also denounce the failure of the U.S. Congressmen to address at their press conference in Vientiane, while visiting Laos, the clearly articulated concerns of the European Union in their recent resolution of November 26, 2009, urging the release of all Lao political and religious dissidents, and prisoners of conscience, including the Lao student pro-democracy leaders of the October 1999 Movement for Democracy as well as the November 2, 2009 reformist marcher leaders who were arrested.
“It is deplorable that [Faleomavaega and his colleagues] did not visit, or seek to visit, the secret camps and prisons in more remote areas in Laos where most of the Hmong refugees as well as Laotian dissidents are being jailed, tortured and imprisoned. Many of these secret prisons and camps in Laos are administered jointly by the Vietnam Peoples Army (VPA) and Lao Peoples Army (LPA).
“Independent journalists from ‘The Age’ in Australia and other human rights organizations and activists have documented the existence of secret camps and prisons in Laos where refugees and dissidents are held in squalid conditions.
“Other independent sources, including the New York Times, Al Jazeera, Time Magazine, Doctors Without Borders, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Freedom House, the Foreign Prisoners Support Service have documented human rights abuses against Lao Hmong refugees as well as the enclaves of Lao and Hmong civilian and dissidents hiding in the jungles and mountains that suffering from starvation, military attacks and persecution in Laos.
“Hundreds of Lao Hmong refugees have disappeared or have been killed by the Lao government and military in recent years. Moreover, many hundreds of Laotians, were arrested in Laos in November of 2009, and in recent years, seeking to organize political and economic reform movements as a result of the one-party military regime and its systemic corruption and exploitation of the Laotian people.
“Additional hundreds of independent Laotian and Hmong Christian, Catholic, Animist and Buddhist religious believers, who continue to flee Lao military and security force persecution and attacks, according to independent religious and non-governmental organizations.
“Religious persecution of the Laotian and Hmong people, including the thousands of refugees who fled to Thailand and then were forcibly repatriated back to Laos, was never discussed by [Faleomavaega] or the other U.S. Congressmen. Lao Hmong and minority Protestant Christian, Catholic and Animist believers have been brutally persecuted in Laos as well as by the Thai military in refugee camps prior to their forced repatriation back to secret camps in Laos.
“We are concerned that the three U.S. Congressmen have, at their press conference in Vientiane and in subsequent public comments, repeatedly misled the international community about the nature of the regime in Laos and the plight of the Lao and Hmong people; They have helped the Lao government with its devious and terrible agenda to force Lao Hmong political refugees and asylum seekers back to Laos and oppress and persecute them;
“Moreover, it is deplorable that Congressmen Joseph Cao, Faleomavaega and Mike Honda did not visit the jailed Lao student leaders or the Lao and Hmong political and religious dissidents imprisoned in Laos.
“At a critical time in the Lao Hmong refugee crisis, the three Congressmen made no effort to address these key issues or other vital human rights concerns at their press conference in Vientiane, Laos or its aftermath in Washington, D.C. Congressman Joseph Cao, Congressman Eni Faleomavaega and Mike Honda have perpetuated the Lao government's propaganda against the freedom-loving Laotian and Hmong people, and the defenseless refugees forced back to Laos."
The Joint International Communiqué from which the above information was drawn was cosponsored and issued by the following organizations: United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc., the Lao Human Rights Council, Inc., the Laos Institute for Democracy, the Lao Veterans of America, Inc., the Hmong Advancement, Inc. , Hmong Advance, Inc. , Lao Abroad Solidarity Foundation, Lao Hmong Students Association, Laotian Students Organization for Democracy; Laotian Community of Louisiana, Lao Hmong Community of Minnesota, Hmong Community Organization of Minnesota, Laotian Community of Minnesota, Laotian Community Network of Texas and Louisiana; Laotian Community of New York; Michigan Lao Hmong Community Group; Laotian Community of Virginia; Lao Hmong Community of California; Laotian Community of Tennessee, Lao Hmong Community of North Carolina, Laotian Community of Florida and others.
These groups are the latest who can get in line behind others who have been incensed by Faleomavaega's controversial pronouncements during his various travels in Asia and the Pacific over the last three years, especially during the three frightening years since he has become subcommittee chairman for the region. Of course, he has little real influence on U.S. policy but while that is understood in Washington, it is not appreciated in the region or especially in his home district, where the local daily paper, Samoa News, where his sister-in-law is an editor, carefully keeps controversy out of print.
Faleomavaega has managed to alienate Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Indonesia and Turkey in the past three years as well as groups struggling against repressive regimes in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and China. Shhhh. Don't tell anyone, especially not his cheering squad in American Samoa.
According to CPPA, over 8,000 Lao Hmong refugees who fled political and religious persecution in Laos were forced by the Thai and Lao military back to Laos from 2007-2009. Between Christmas and the New Year holiday, over 4,700 Lao Hmong refugees were forced back to Laos. Most of the refugees have been imprisoned in Laos’ secret network of jails and camps in remote provinces. Australia journalists from “The Age” recently sought access to one such secret camp where many Hmong refugees were held behind razor wire in squalid conditions. The Australian journalists were arrested and their cameras reportedly seized; they were expelled.
Laos, under the Hanoi-backed communist Lao Peoples Democratic Republic (LPDR), is one of the most corrupt, says CPPA, and oppressive regimes in the world according to a recent public sector corruption and press freedom indexes issued by the respected non-governmental organizations Transparency International (TI) and Reporters Without Borders (JSF). Laos is listed at the bottom of these indexes along with its allies in North Korea, Burma and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV).
The following is taken from the text of the joint international communiqué issued by the CPPA and a coalition of Laotian and Hmong organizations:
“We are deeply saddened by, and must denounce in the strongest terms, the deplorable, distorted and misleading comments of the three U.S. Congressmen, Joseph Cao, Mike Honda and Eni Faleomavaega, during their recent visit to Laos, and to the Lao government's Potemkin Village show camp at Pha Lak in Vientiane Province. Tragically, the U.S. Congressmen have helped to cover-up and whitewash the horrific crimes of the Lao government against the Laotian and Hmong people and refugees who were brutally forced back from Thailand in recent years by the Thai and Lao military,” the International Communique stated.
“It is important to note that Pha Lak village houses only a fraction of the Hmong refugees returned to Laos in previous years as well as many dozens of Lao government informants and undercover agents. It is a tightly-controlled, Lao government camp upgraded for foreign visitors and administered in cooperation with the LPDR Ministry of Propaganda.
“The Lao government and military continue to attack and kill unarmed Laotian and Hmong people. Congressmen Joseph Cao, Mike Honda and Eni Faleomavaega, at their press conference in Vientiane and upon their return to the Washington, D.C., have remained silent on the horrific human rights violations, persecution, atrocities and war crimes that have been inflicted on the Laotian and Hmong people in recent months and years, including the arrest of over 300 peaceful protest marchers in November of last year that prompted a resolution that was passed by the European Parliament that was passed on Thanksgiving Day, November 26.
“We also denounce the failure of the U.S. Congressmen to address at their press conference in Vientiane, while visiting Laos, the clearly articulated concerns of the European Union in their recent resolution of November 26, 2009, urging the release of all Lao political and religious dissidents, and prisoners of conscience, including the Lao student pro-democracy leaders of the October 1999 Movement for Democracy as well as the November 2, 2009 reformist marcher leaders who were arrested.
“It is deplorable that [Faleomavaega and his colleagues] did not visit, or seek to visit, the secret camps and prisons in more remote areas in Laos where most of the Hmong refugees as well as Laotian dissidents are being jailed, tortured and imprisoned. Many of these secret prisons and camps in Laos are administered jointly by the Vietnam Peoples Army (VPA) and Lao Peoples Army (LPA).
“Independent journalists from ‘The Age’ in Australia and other human rights organizations and activists have documented the existence of secret camps and prisons in Laos where refugees and dissidents are held in squalid conditions.
“Other independent sources, including the New York Times, Al Jazeera, Time Magazine, Doctors Without Borders, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Freedom House, the Foreign Prisoners Support Service have documented human rights abuses against Lao Hmong refugees as well as the enclaves of Lao and Hmong civilian and dissidents hiding in the jungles and mountains that suffering from starvation, military attacks and persecution in Laos.
“Hundreds of Lao Hmong refugees have disappeared or have been killed by the Lao government and military in recent years. Moreover, many hundreds of Laotians, were arrested in Laos in November of 2009, and in recent years, seeking to organize political and economic reform movements as a result of the one-party military regime and its systemic corruption and exploitation of the Laotian people.
“Additional hundreds of independent Laotian and Hmong Christian, Catholic, Animist and Buddhist religious believers, who continue to flee Lao military and security force persecution and attacks, according to independent religious and non-governmental organizations.
“Religious persecution of the Laotian and Hmong people, including the thousands of refugees who fled to Thailand and then were forcibly repatriated back to Laos, was never discussed by [Faleomavaega] or the other U.S. Congressmen. Lao Hmong and minority Protestant Christian, Catholic and Animist believers have been brutally persecuted in Laos as well as by the Thai military in refugee camps prior to their forced repatriation back to secret camps in Laos.
“We are concerned that the three U.S. Congressmen have, at their press conference in Vientiane and in subsequent public comments, repeatedly misled the international community about the nature of the regime in Laos and the plight of the Lao and Hmong people; They have helped the Lao government with its devious and terrible agenda to force Lao Hmong political refugees and asylum seekers back to Laos and oppress and persecute them;
“Moreover, it is deplorable that Congressmen Joseph Cao, Faleomavaega and Mike Honda did not visit the jailed Lao student leaders or the Lao and Hmong political and religious dissidents imprisoned in Laos.
“At a critical time in the Lao Hmong refugee crisis, the three Congressmen made no effort to address these key issues or other vital human rights concerns at their press conference in Vientiane, Laos or its aftermath in Washington, D.C. Congressman Joseph Cao, Congressman Eni Faleomavaega and Mike Honda have perpetuated the Lao government's propaganda against the freedom-loving Laotian and Hmong people, and the defenseless refugees forced back to Laos."
The Joint International Communiqué from which the above information was drawn was cosponsored and issued by the following organizations: United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc., the Lao Human Rights Council, Inc., the Laos Institute for Democracy, the Lao Veterans of America, Inc., the Hmong Advancement, Inc. , Hmong Advance, Inc. , Lao Abroad Solidarity Foundation, Lao Hmong Students Association, Laotian Students Organization for Democracy; Laotian Community of Louisiana, Lao Hmong Community of Minnesota, Hmong Community Organization of Minnesota, Laotian Community of Minnesota, Laotian Community Network of Texas and Louisiana; Laotian Community of New York; Michigan Lao Hmong Community Group; Laotian Community of Virginia; Lao Hmong Community of California; Laotian Community of Tennessee, Lao Hmong Community of North Carolina, Laotian Community of Florida and others.
These groups are the latest who can get in line behind others who have been incensed by Faleomavaega's controversial pronouncements during his various travels in Asia and the Pacific over the last three years, especially during the three frightening years since he has become subcommittee chairman for the region. Of course, he has little real influence on U.S. policy but while that is understood in Washington, it is not appreciated in the region or especially in his home district, where the local daily paper, Samoa News, where his sister-in-law is an editor, carefully keeps controversy out of print.
Faleomavaega has managed to alienate Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Indonesia and Turkey in the past three years as well as groups struggling against repressive regimes in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and China. Shhhh. Don't tell anyone, especially not his cheering squad in American Samoa.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Eni to Use Palau to Test influence
Before a stunned audience at the Department of the Interior’s annual insular investment in Honolulu last week, Faleomavaega announced he would undertake an effort to move primary congressional jurisdiction from the House Committee on Natural Resources to the House Foreign Affairs Committee. In effect, this move, if successful, would strip Palau issues from the Natural Resources subcommittee on Insular Affairs, Oceans and Wildlife, on which Eni sits as a senior majority member, to the Foreign Affairs Asia, Pacific and Global Environment subcommittee that he chairs.
Since the House would be unlikely to move jurisdiction over Palau from Natural Resources to Foreign Affairs without moving jurisdiction for the other Freely Associated States at the same time, Eni is making a real power play that has enormous ramifications for him. Were he to succeed, it would amount to a major humiliation for Madeleine Bordallo (D), his fellow delegate from Guam who chairs the insular panel, and would send chills up and down the spine of State Department officials, who prefer to handle diplomatic relations with the Micronesian states but not administer funds for them.
In light of Eni’s sneak attack, ironically launched in Honolulu, it also will be interesting to see just how enthusiastic Bordallo will be to look after American Samoa’s interests in her subcommittee from now on. After subcommittee assignments were announced following last November’s election, Eni was quoted in the news as saying that now that Madeleine was positioned to protect territorial interests for everyone on Natural Resources, it gave him wide berth to do the same on the Asia-Pacific subcommittee. Since his subcommittee has not a stitch of responsibility for territorial issues, of course his assertion is laughable on the face of it. Nonetheless, Samoa News swallowed hook, line and sinker his contention that his keeping an eye on U.S. foreign policy in the region somehow would benefit American Samoa and he would not need to be all that vigilant on Natural Resources.
Were he not to succeed in this bold move against Bordallo, Eni would suffer another major humiliation in Washington, coming hard on the heels of his recent embarrassment at the hands of his colleagues on his unsuccessful attempt to change the wording of a House Resolution on Taiwan. Of course, just as in the case of the Taiwan issue, any further loss of Eni's prestige and influence likely would be confined to Washington--which is important enough, since that is his theater of operation--because it is likely the major media outlet at home, Samoa News, will continue to suppress news unfavorable to its knight in shining armor. As noted here before, Eni’s (whose real family name is Hunkin) sister-in-law, Teri Hunkin, is an editor at the paper.
Meanwhile, speaking of the Taiwan issue, some critics have wondered if Eni were a witting front man for Beijing on Taiwan matters, with one blogger astutely noting that the roving congressman also was caught toasting Communist strongman Ho Chi Minh in Hanoi in December, 2007. As we have pointed out, Eni was an early member of the radical leftist Congressional Progressive Caucus founded by enrolled Socialist then-congressman Bernie Sanders in the early 1990s and only dropped his membership quietly three years ago during a close election campaign after he was criticized publicly for his association. Eni is decidedly to the left of not only the population at large but his own Mormon political base.
Now some other blogs also are beginning to question whether he is a communist. The Doctor Bulldog and Ronin Blog, for example, republished from TyskNews.com a list of “known socialists and commies in our government” that included Eni, although TyskNews has updated the list and dropped him. The spotlight is beginning to shine on congressional socialists because of rising conservative concern that Obama Administration budget proposals are driving the government in the direction of socialism.
Whether or not he is a socialist or a closet communist, there is no doubt that Eni is to the left of center and much more liberal than his constituency. There also is rising concern here that his support of Big Labor’s Check Card proposal will open the door to unionization of our tuna canneries. Coupled with the minimum wage increase that has been forced upon the islands, the days of the canneries could be severely numbered.
Are these seemingly separate questions somehow connected? From seizing control of Micronesia policy to minimum wage, card check and his secret amendment to permit foreign bottoms a backdoor way to fish in South Pacific EEZs, we think they may be. As events play out, we think the dots will begin to connect. Readers here will know what is happening but the general public here will remain clueless, thanks to media suppression of the news.
Since the House would be unlikely to move jurisdiction over Palau from Natural Resources to Foreign Affairs without moving jurisdiction for the other Freely Associated States at the same time, Eni is making a real power play that has enormous ramifications for him. Were he to succeed, it would amount to a major humiliation for Madeleine Bordallo (D), his fellow delegate from Guam who chairs the insular panel, and would send chills up and down the spine of State Department officials, who prefer to handle diplomatic relations with the Micronesian states but not administer funds for them.
In light of Eni’s sneak attack, ironically launched in Honolulu, it also will be interesting to see just how enthusiastic Bordallo will be to look after American Samoa’s interests in her subcommittee from now on. After subcommittee assignments were announced following last November’s election, Eni was quoted in the news as saying that now that Madeleine was positioned to protect territorial interests for everyone on Natural Resources, it gave him wide berth to do the same on the Asia-Pacific subcommittee. Since his subcommittee has not a stitch of responsibility for territorial issues, of course his assertion is laughable on the face of it. Nonetheless, Samoa News swallowed hook, line and sinker his contention that his keeping an eye on U.S. foreign policy in the region somehow would benefit American Samoa and he would not need to be all that vigilant on Natural Resources.
Were he not to succeed in this bold move against Bordallo, Eni would suffer another major humiliation in Washington, coming hard on the heels of his recent embarrassment at the hands of his colleagues on his unsuccessful attempt to change the wording of a House Resolution on Taiwan. Of course, just as in the case of the Taiwan issue, any further loss of Eni's prestige and influence likely would be confined to Washington--which is important enough, since that is his theater of operation--because it is likely the major media outlet at home, Samoa News, will continue to suppress news unfavorable to its knight in shining armor. As noted here before, Eni’s (whose real family name is Hunkin) sister-in-law, Teri Hunkin, is an editor at the paper.
Meanwhile, speaking of the Taiwan issue, some critics have wondered if Eni were a witting front man for Beijing on Taiwan matters, with one blogger astutely noting that the roving congressman also was caught toasting Communist strongman Ho Chi Minh in Hanoi in December, 2007. As we have pointed out, Eni was an early member of the radical leftist Congressional Progressive Caucus founded by enrolled Socialist then-congressman Bernie Sanders in the early 1990s and only dropped his membership quietly three years ago during a close election campaign after he was criticized publicly for his association. Eni is decidedly to the left of not only the population at large but his own Mormon political base.
Now some other blogs also are beginning to question whether he is a communist. The Doctor Bulldog and Ronin Blog, for example, republished from TyskNews.com a list of “known socialists and commies in our government” that included Eni, although TyskNews has updated the list and dropped him. The spotlight is beginning to shine on congressional socialists because of rising conservative concern that Obama Administration budget proposals are driving the government in the direction of socialism.
Whether or not he is a socialist or a closet communist, there is no doubt that Eni is to the left of center and much more liberal than his constituency. There also is rising concern here that his support of Big Labor’s Check Card proposal will open the door to unionization of our tuna canneries. Coupled with the minimum wage increase that has been forced upon the islands, the days of the canneries could be severely numbered.
Are these seemingly separate questions somehow connected? From seizing control of Micronesia policy to minimum wage, card check and his secret amendment to permit foreign bottoms a backdoor way to fish in South Pacific EEZs, we think they may be. As events play out, we think the dots will begin to connect. Readers here will know what is happening but the general public here will remain clueless, thanks to media suppression of the news.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Taipei Times Takes Another Whack at Eni
Remember what we said about Mark Twain’s famous quote about never picking a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel? Well, the Taipei Times has signaled it is not yet quite through with Mr. Faleomavaega, the Samoan non-voting delegate to who found out the Taiwan lobby is a lot more influential with his House colleagues than
he is.
This time it is the turn of Johnny Neihu, the popular Times columnist. A couple of factual inaccuracies do not detract from his analysis of Eni’s fumbled attempt to water down the House Resolution designed to reaffirm U.S. support for and commitment to Taiwan.
“Countless polls have shown that only a small percentage of crazies want either unification or independence right here, right now," wrote Neihu in the April 11 edition of the Times. “Most Taiwanese want things to stay as they are for the time being. This is what they voted for. They did not vote for backroom deals between KMT hacks and the Chinese Communist Party. This is why we have Suspicious Minds. We don’t want to live under another murderous regime. Been there, done that. Why don’t people like Mr. F[aleomavaega] get this?”
Perhaps Eni would better comprehend what Johnny is saying if he would just remember that virtually no one in this territory either wants to disturb the status quo. People who want to merge with Samoa or become independent separately are scarce to find.
“Maybe deep down the congressman would be nicer to us if he read up on some Asian history,” wrote Neihu in his widely read “News Watch" column. “I am assuming this based on comments he made during a visit to Vietnam in 2007,” he wrote, noting that Eni is a Vietnam War veteran.
Neihu advises his readers that Eni “called Ho Chi Minh a ‘great leader’ in a controversial 2007 visit to Vietnam and quotes Eni as saying Ho ‘only wanted to get rid of 100 years of French colonialism and establish a better life for his own people.’ Well,” concludes Neihu, “we here in Taiwan haven’t quite healed our colonial injuries, but we have fought for and achieved a better life; freedom of speech and of the press; a good standard of living; and the right to kick out a sh*tty government. We would like to keep it that way. But becoming a special autonomous zone of China won’t guarantee these things, as the Hong Kong experiment has demonstrated. This is why we value the TRA and its advocacy of a resolution acceptable to us, and this is why we don’t appreciate fair weather friends meddling with it.”
Neihu made a couple of inconsequential factual errors, such as noting that Eni was chosen for a part as an extra in an Elvis Presley movie because of his body length tattoo. The Hawaii-raised politician only got that tattoo later in life as he was gearing up to win votes in American Samoa elections later in his career, which is why he did notmincur the wrath of school administrators.
Moreover, while Neihu is puzzled why Eni would try to sabotage U.S.-Taiwan relations at the same time he is trying to promote the Taiwan ship building industry by making it easier for Taiwan-built boats to fish in U.S. and South Pacific EEZs, it is not because the bill he is supporting in Congress would aid American Samoa’s canneries. If anything, that bill, if enacted, may hasten the canneries’ departure. This deal is purely financial, with Eni getting heavy campaign contributions from special interests backing his bill. Some have suggested that if he were to leave Congress, he also might wind up as a well-paid adviser to those interests as well-—-if the bill were to go through.
So, at least based on this little secret amendment Eni tried to pass last year, Mr. Neihu makes a faulty assessment that “like any good congressman, Mr. F spends his time trying to ensure his constituents have jobs.” As readers of this blog know all too well, Eni spends most of his time traveling and very little time on ensuring his constituents have jobs. Had he been at his duty station when the critical minimum wage policy decision was been made, American Samoa might have continued to receive the exemption that is crucial to keeping the canneries in place.
Our speculation: Expect Eni to come charging back to “correct the record” on his tattoo and his fishing fleet bill further to divert attention from his humiliating defeat on the TRA resolution.
he is.
This time it is the turn of Johnny Neihu, the popular Times columnist. A couple of factual inaccuracies do not detract from his analysis of Eni’s fumbled attempt to water down the House Resolution designed to reaffirm U.S. support for and commitment to Taiwan.
“Countless polls have shown that only a small percentage of crazies want either unification or independence right here, right now," wrote Neihu in the April 11 edition of the Times. “Most Taiwanese want things to stay as they are for the time being. This is what they voted for. They did not vote for backroom deals between KMT hacks and the Chinese Communist Party. This is why we have Suspicious Minds. We don’t want to live under another murderous regime. Been there, done that. Why don’t people like Mr. F[aleomavaega] get this?”
Perhaps Eni would better comprehend what Johnny is saying if he would just remember that virtually no one in this territory either wants to disturb the status quo. People who want to merge with Samoa or become independent separately are scarce to find.
“Maybe deep down the congressman would be nicer to us if he read up on some Asian history,” wrote Neihu in his widely read “News Watch" column. “I am assuming this based on comments he made during a visit to Vietnam in 2007,” he wrote, noting that Eni is a Vietnam War veteran.
Neihu advises his readers that Eni “called Ho Chi Minh a ‘great leader’ in a controversial 2007 visit to Vietnam and quotes Eni as saying Ho ‘only wanted to get rid of 100 years of French colonialism and establish a better life for his own people.’ Well,” concludes Neihu, “we here in Taiwan haven’t quite healed our colonial injuries, but we have fought for and achieved a better life; freedom of speech and of the press; a good standard of living; and the right to kick out a sh*tty government. We would like to keep it that way. But becoming a special autonomous zone of China won’t guarantee these things, as the Hong Kong experiment has demonstrated. This is why we value the TRA and its advocacy of a resolution acceptable to us, and this is why we don’t appreciate fair weather friends meddling with it.”
Neihu made a couple of inconsequential factual errors, such as noting that Eni was chosen for a part as an extra in an Elvis Presley movie because of his body length tattoo. The Hawaii-raised politician only got that tattoo later in life as he was gearing up to win votes in American Samoa elections later in his career, which is why he did notmincur the wrath of school administrators.
Moreover, while Neihu is puzzled why Eni would try to sabotage U.S.-Taiwan relations at the same time he is trying to promote the Taiwan ship building industry by making it easier for Taiwan-built boats to fish in U.S. and South Pacific EEZs, it is not because the bill he is supporting in Congress would aid American Samoa’s canneries. If anything, that bill, if enacted, may hasten the canneries’ departure. This deal is purely financial, with Eni getting heavy campaign contributions from special interests backing his bill. Some have suggested that if he were to leave Congress, he also might wind up as a well-paid adviser to those interests as well-—-if the bill were to go through.
So, at least based on this little secret amendment Eni tried to pass last year, Mr. Neihu makes a faulty assessment that “like any good congressman, Mr. F spends his time trying to ensure his constituents have jobs.” As readers of this blog know all too well, Eni spends most of his time traveling and very little time on ensuring his constituents have jobs. Had he been at his duty station when the critical minimum wage policy decision was been made, American Samoa might have continued to receive the exemption that is crucial to keeping the canneries in place.
Our speculation: Expect Eni to come charging back to “correct the record” on his tattoo and his fishing fleet bill further to divert attention from his humiliating defeat on the TRA resolution.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
FALEOMAVAEGA BATTLES ON
As we explained earlier when we described the responsibilities of non-voting delegates, it is not like they have nothing better to do than battle with the press. But Faleomavaega must have some time on his hands -- perhaps at some airport awaiting a delayed plane on his next excursion out of Washington.
Howard Berman must not have called him in because, as we predicted, he came roaring back at the Taipei Times and, in true form, beat the dead horse yet again! Let's take apart his latest skirmish with the Times in his second letter to the editor on April 8. Keep in mind as you are reading this that his sole objective is to deflect attention away from his humiliation at the hands of his own Democrat colleagues who reversed his Beijing-backed revisions to the TRA resolution on which he had insisted at the subcommittee he chairs, over which he has full control.
Faleomavaega response No. 2
Eni: Once again, Taipei Times has inaccurately reported on the workings of the US Congress and my position regarding Taiwan and Beijing.
ABCDEFG: Deflection. The fact is the Times accurately reported that the House reversed Eni's amendments to the TRA resolution. Workings of Congress are not at issue. It's the results.
Eni: Most recently, Taipei Times published my rebuttal on March 31 to a guest editorial [sic] printed in its paper on March 25 in which an anonymous author misrepresented my involvement with the TRA [Taiwan Relations Act] legislation.
ABCDEFG: As the Times notes in the use of the term [sic], this is not a guest editorial. The Times made that point in its editor's note following his first letter, which he must have read in order to write this second letter. This was the paper's own editorial and in standard journalistic practice, editorials are not signed.
Eni: To be clear, Taipei Times falsely states that I cannot support my claim that changes I made to the TRA legislation [sic] had the full backing of Committee members. If Taipei Times understood the workings of Congress, it would have understood what I already stated in my previous response — that the changes I made were supported by our Subcommittee members, the Chairman and Ranking Member of the full Committee, as well as the bill’s author, each of whom approved the measure to go forward by unanimous consent.
ABCDEFG: Eni arrogantly insults the Times about the paper's knowledge of how Congress works but makes a fool out of himself in so doing. Note that the Times again employs the term [sic] as a gracious way to put him down. What they are doing is demonstrating that Eni has made an error in calling the TRA resolution legislation. It is not. It is a resolution. Thus he is demonstrating that it is he who does not understand how Congress works, not the Times.
Eni: The bill then moved from the Subcommittee to the full Committee, as this is how the process works in the US Congress. Although the Chairman and Ranking Member of the full Committee had already agreed to the Subcommittee changes, other Members, which is their prerogative in a democracy, asked for the word “cornerstone” to be put back in the legislation to replace the word “vital,” which I had used instead. Upon the advice of the US House of Representatives’ legislative counsel — which argued that the word “vital” (which means “essential,” “critical,” “most important”) was legally stronger than the word “cornerstone” (which means “foundation,” “starting point,” “beginning”) — Republicans and Democrats of the full Committee reached an agreement to make the change back to “cornerstone,” and the bill was then sent directly to the House floor, with no further changes.
ABCDEFG: This is a time tested Eni tactic: over explanation. If you can't beat them, confuse them. Buried in all his verbiage is the concession that the "full committee reached an agreement to make the change back to 'cornerstone.'"
Eni: Finally, regarding Taipei Times’ assertion that I am confused about the TRA, I would kindly point out that the Taipei Times should review the TRA, as contrary to your assertions, the TRA absolutely implies that the US wants peace — peace between Taipei and Beijing, peace in the Western Pacific and peace for US troops. This is why the TRA plainly states that it is the policy of the United States “to preserve and promote extensive, close, and friendly commercial, cultural, and other relations between the people of the United States and the people on Taiwan, as well as the people on the China mainland and all other peoples of the Western Pacific area.”
ABCDEFG: Once again Eni employs one of his favorite tactics. He admits in the previous paragraph that he lost the battle over cornerstone, so now he wants to change the argument to what the TRA means to the concept of "peace." Moreover, "absolute implies" sounds like one of those oxymorons like "jumbo shrimp," "guest host" and "army intelligence."
Eni: While I have always supported the people on Taiwan, my first priority will always be to prevent as much as possible a gross misuse of US military forces to fight any unnecessary war and, for this reason, I will continue to support the long-standing position of the United States on the issue of Taiwan, which is to support peaceful relations across the Strait and to maintain the One China policy. Every President since 1979 has affirmed this position.
ABCDEFG: Another Eni tactic: here he infers that the Times does not want peace. He is standing as a noble and lonely guardian against the wicked agenda of the Times.
Eni: And no matter how Taipei Times twists the truth, or contorts the words of Senator Richard Lugar or President Ronald Reagan, the fact remains “that the Taiwan question is a matter for the Chinese people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to resolve.” Hopefully, the Taipei Times and FAPA [Formosan Association for Public Affairs] will do their part to support peace more than ever in a manner that is respectful of America’s young men and women who do not deserve to be dragged into another war, now or in the future, just because sensible people refuse to get along.
ABCDEFG: He goes on to imply that the Times and FAPA want to drag American troops into war over Taiwan.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2009/04/03/2003440085
This should be the end of this skirmish because Eni is too dense to understand how the Times put him down with classic subtlety. That is the only reason they published his second rebuttal. Remember Eni, the Times buys ink by the barrel.
Howard Berman must not have called him in because, as we predicted, he came roaring back at the Taipei Times and, in true form, beat the dead horse yet again! Let's take apart his latest skirmish with the Times in his second letter to the editor on April 8. Keep in mind as you are reading this that his sole objective is to deflect attention away from his humiliation at the hands of his own Democrat colleagues who reversed his Beijing-backed revisions to the TRA resolution on which he had insisted at the subcommittee he chairs, over which he has full control.
Faleomavaega response No. 2
Eni: Once again, Taipei Times has inaccurately reported on the workings of the US Congress and my position regarding Taiwan and Beijing.
ABCDEFG: Deflection. The fact is the Times accurately reported that the House reversed Eni's amendments to the TRA resolution. Workings of Congress are not at issue. It's the results.
Eni: Most recently, Taipei Times published my rebuttal on March 31 to a guest editorial [sic] printed in its paper on March 25 in which an anonymous author misrepresented my involvement with the TRA [Taiwan Relations Act] legislation.
ABCDEFG: As the Times notes in the use of the term [sic], this is not a guest editorial. The Times made that point in its editor's note following his first letter, which he must have read in order to write this second letter. This was the paper's own editorial and in standard journalistic practice, editorials are not signed.
Eni: To be clear, Taipei Times falsely states that I cannot support my claim that changes I made to the TRA legislation [sic] had the full backing of Committee members. If Taipei Times understood the workings of Congress, it would have understood what I already stated in my previous response — that the changes I made were supported by our Subcommittee members, the Chairman and Ranking Member of the full Committee, as well as the bill’s author, each of whom approved the measure to go forward by unanimous consent.
ABCDEFG: Eni arrogantly insults the Times about the paper's knowledge of how Congress works but makes a fool out of himself in so doing. Note that the Times again employs the term [sic] as a gracious way to put him down. What they are doing is demonstrating that Eni has made an error in calling the TRA resolution legislation. It is not. It is a resolution. Thus he is demonstrating that it is he who does not understand how Congress works, not the Times.
Eni: The bill then moved from the Subcommittee to the full Committee, as this is how the process works in the US Congress. Although the Chairman and Ranking Member of the full Committee had already agreed to the Subcommittee changes, other Members, which is their prerogative in a democracy, asked for the word “cornerstone” to be put back in the legislation to replace the word “vital,” which I had used instead. Upon the advice of the US House of Representatives’ legislative counsel — which argued that the word “vital” (which means “essential,” “critical,” “most important”) was legally stronger than the word “cornerstone” (which means “foundation,” “starting point,” “beginning”) — Republicans and Democrats of the full Committee reached an agreement to make the change back to “cornerstone,” and the bill was then sent directly to the House floor, with no further changes.
ABCDEFG: This is a time tested Eni tactic: over explanation. If you can't beat them, confuse them. Buried in all his verbiage is the concession that the "full committee reached an agreement to make the change back to 'cornerstone.'"
Eni: Finally, regarding Taipei Times’ assertion that I am confused about the TRA, I would kindly point out that the Taipei Times should review the TRA, as contrary to your assertions, the TRA absolutely implies that the US wants peace — peace between Taipei and Beijing, peace in the Western Pacific and peace for US troops. This is why the TRA plainly states that it is the policy of the United States “to preserve and promote extensive, close, and friendly commercial, cultural, and other relations between the people of the United States and the people on Taiwan, as well as the people on the China mainland and all other peoples of the Western Pacific area.”
ABCDEFG: Once again Eni employs one of his favorite tactics. He admits in the previous paragraph that he lost the battle over cornerstone, so now he wants to change the argument to what the TRA means to the concept of "peace." Moreover, "absolute implies" sounds like one of those oxymorons like "jumbo shrimp," "guest host" and "army intelligence."
Eni: While I have always supported the people on Taiwan, my first priority will always be to prevent as much as possible a gross misuse of US military forces to fight any unnecessary war and, for this reason, I will continue to support the long-standing position of the United States on the issue of Taiwan, which is to support peaceful relations across the Strait and to maintain the One China policy. Every President since 1979 has affirmed this position.
ABCDEFG: Another Eni tactic: here he infers that the Times does not want peace. He is standing as a noble and lonely guardian against the wicked agenda of the Times.
Eni: And no matter how Taipei Times twists the truth, or contorts the words of Senator Richard Lugar or President Ronald Reagan, the fact remains “that the Taiwan question is a matter for the Chinese people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to resolve.” Hopefully, the Taipei Times and FAPA [Formosan Association for Public Affairs] will do their part to support peace more than ever in a manner that is respectful of America’s young men and women who do not deserve to be dragged into another war, now or in the future, just because sensible people refuse to get along.
ABCDEFG: He goes on to imply that the Times and FAPA want to drag American troops into war over Taiwan.
***
Oh, this is so classic Eni. You just have to love it. If you have the time, go back to Samoa News archives. It's filled with all sorts of jibberish like this on a variety of issues large and small. The Taipei Times demonstrated that it understands that Eni is trying to draw them into a debate on his terms and won't fall for it. They contented themselves with a footnote saying they stand by what they have written. That's the only way to handle this idiot. Read it all here:http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2009/04/03/2003440085
This should be the end of this skirmish because Eni is too dense to understand how the Times put him down with classic subtlety. That is the only reason they published his second rebuttal. Remember Eni, the Times buys ink by the barrel.
Saturday, April 4, 2009
The Faleomavaega Problem
In addition to the comments that have been posted here reacting to Faleomavaega’s stupidity about Taiwan, there have been a lot of messages directly to this blogger by e-mail. So let us answer questions posed by numerous writers.
First of all, do not make the mistake of dismissing him as nothing more than a non-voting delegate. What that means simply is that he cannot vote on the final passage of legislation on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives. That is because the U.S. Constitution restricts voting to Members from the states and American Samoa is not a state. Article I Section 2 quite clearly says “The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second year by the people of the several states.” For all other purposes, Article I Section 5 of the Constitution says “each House shall be the judge of the Elections, Returns and Qualifications of its own members . . . and may determine the rules of its proceedings.”
So the office of delegate (there are six of them) is established under the rules of the House and privileges of membership accorded to the Members from the states are accorded to the delegates by House Rules. Because the fate of very few measures is determined by a vote on the Floor, the loss of this vote diminishes only slightly the power a senior delegate who has been there long enough can wield.
The House has avoided controversy because people have taken little notice of these delegates since turnover has kept most of them from becoming senior enough to acquire power and the ones who have been fortunate enough to get to that level have tended to stay with subcommittees dealing with territorial issues. Faleomavaega’s predecessor was on the verge of breaking out of this pattern in the mid-1980s with a the chairmanship of a public works subcommittee but got into legal trouble and had to resign before he really could do anything with it.
Faleomavaega is considered a loose cannon in Congress, even by his own caucus, but they consider themselves fortunate that he has shown an interest in foreign affairs because that means his chairmanship is on a committee where he can do only minimal damage to his party’s agenda in the House. While that may be of little consolation to those whose interest is U.S. relations with Asia, the fact is the House Foreign Affairs Committee has very little real influence because the Constitution vests in the President the sole power to conduct foreign policy. The Senate can exercise some influence because it has the power to ratify treaties and to confirm ambassadors and the secretary of state. The House, however, has no formal powers at all over foreign policy except through the appropriations process, and that involves a separate subcommittee on appropriations, not the foreign affairs subcommittee. That is why non-partisan groups who annually rank the power of House members rate Faleomavaega unusually low.
So, a succession of administrations has found Faleomavaega but be an irritant and annoyance but little else. And when he does come up with any of his hare-brained pet projects, like adding to the House four at-large seats for American Indian tribes, they just ignore him. Or, as he has become more senior and can advance legislation, they just smack him down, as they did with the Armenian genocide resolution the Speaker pulled from the calendar last year and the reversal of his amendments to the Taiwan resolution last month.
Obviously, we share the view of most of you who have written: the time has come to pull the plug on this joker. It’s not funny any more. Despite his lack of power, some day soon he could cause some real damage. That is no doubt why Hillary Clinton did not invite him to accompany her on her maiden trip to Asia. The only way to him where it hurts is with the voters, and that is a tough job because he has the local media in his pocket, the unwavering support of a loyal base of voters among his fellow Mormons and unlimited financial resources from U.S. trade unions and Chinese Americans who many believe are fronting Beijing’s interests.
The local media issue is particularly vexing. There are only a half dozen stations and only one on them has a news person. That station only does a few five-minute news feeds a day. The television station is owned by the government and its news operation is largely a propaganda tool for the governor, with “newscasters” reading press releases written by the governor’s office. Cable TV is expensive, has little penetration in the market and the one community access channel that did news has gone dark. One newspaper that publishes twice weekly, is a shoe string operation with no news gathering capacity and limited circulation.
That leaves Samoa News, the only privately run daily newspaper in the territory with wide circulation. It also has an on-line presence. But Faleomavaega has that covered. His sister-in-law is an editor and negative coverage of his activities is almost non-existent. There certainly is no negative editorial commentary. This current Taiwan controversy illustrates the point. Since he amended the TRA and caused the backlash, there has been absolutely no coverage of it, despite it being quite newsworthy, especially the fact that he suffered a humiliation at the hands of his colleagues. The readers should know that. That’s part of the way his fitness for public office should be measured.
What doe we get instead? This: http://www.samoanewsonline.com/viewstory.php?storyid=5164&edition=1238839200
Now you see what we face down here. Samoa News not only thinks it is newsworthy to write a story about Faleomavaega’s radio show today but also carries a photograph of him with two adoring reporters from the paper! The boys in his press shop back in Washington will be high-fiving when they read today’s paper and breaking out the champagne and victory cigars again. Got away with another one.
Right now, this blog is about the only way we have to let the people know what their delegate is up to and our on-island readership is not that large either. Bandwidth is slow (we don’t have fiber optic cable yet—but soon) and the phone company has an ISP monopoly. The cost is high so internet penetration is low.
However, that doesn’t mean there is nothing you can do. As you saw if you opened the link above and read the story, you saw that Samoa News provides for on-line comments. So you can use that as a vehicle to complain about the paper carrying non-news like this instead of writing about Faleomavaega’s humiliation in the House, war with the Taipei Times or his past controversies. The editors moderate it so we are skeptical they will carry what you write (we have been blocked in the past) but at least you can see for yourself. You also can try to write to the only independent radio news operation: http://khjnews.solupress.com/. However, as you can see from the list of stories (this is the text of what the anchor reads on the air), the news is pretty much local.
And, of course, to vent your frustration, feel free to continue to comment here and cross post our blog to your own and to others. He can be stop as the blow back from his TRA resolution amendment demonstrates. At some point someone will challenge Faleomavaega for election next year and there is a wealth of ammunition in our blogs to help their research. The public knows hardly any of this. Sad, isn’t it?
First of all, do not make the mistake of dismissing him as nothing more than a non-voting delegate. What that means simply is that he cannot vote on the final passage of legislation on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives. That is because the U.S. Constitution restricts voting to Members from the states and American Samoa is not a state. Article I Section 2 quite clearly says “The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second year by the people of the several states.” For all other purposes, Article I Section 5 of the Constitution says “each House shall be the judge of the Elections, Returns and Qualifications of its own members . . . and may determine the rules of its proceedings.”
So the office of delegate (there are six of them) is established under the rules of the House and privileges of membership accorded to the Members from the states are accorded to the delegates by House Rules. Because the fate of very few measures is determined by a vote on the Floor, the loss of this vote diminishes only slightly the power a senior delegate who has been there long enough can wield.
The House has avoided controversy because people have taken little notice of these delegates since turnover has kept most of them from becoming senior enough to acquire power and the ones who have been fortunate enough to get to that level have tended to stay with subcommittees dealing with territorial issues. Faleomavaega’s predecessor was on the verge of breaking out of this pattern in the mid-1980s with a the chairmanship of a public works subcommittee but got into legal trouble and had to resign before he really could do anything with it.
Faleomavaega is considered a loose cannon in Congress, even by his own caucus, but they consider themselves fortunate that he has shown an interest in foreign affairs because that means his chairmanship is on a committee where he can do only minimal damage to his party’s agenda in the House. While that may be of little consolation to those whose interest is U.S. relations with Asia, the fact is the House Foreign Affairs Committee has very little real influence because the Constitution vests in the President the sole power to conduct foreign policy. The Senate can exercise some influence because it has the power to ratify treaties and to confirm ambassadors and the secretary of state. The House, however, has no formal powers at all over foreign policy except through the appropriations process, and that involves a separate subcommittee on appropriations, not the foreign affairs subcommittee. That is why non-partisan groups who annually rank the power of House members rate Faleomavaega unusually low.
So, a succession of administrations has found Faleomavaega but be an irritant and annoyance but little else. And when he does come up with any of his hare-brained pet projects, like adding to the House four at-large seats for American Indian tribes, they just ignore him. Or, as he has become more senior and can advance legislation, they just smack him down, as they did with the Armenian genocide resolution the Speaker pulled from the calendar last year and the reversal of his amendments to the Taiwan resolution last month.
Obviously, we share the view of most of you who have written: the time has come to pull the plug on this joker. It’s not funny any more. Despite his lack of power, some day soon he could cause some real damage. That is no doubt why Hillary Clinton did not invite him to accompany her on her maiden trip to Asia. The only way to him where it hurts is with the voters, and that is a tough job because he has the local media in his pocket, the unwavering support of a loyal base of voters among his fellow Mormons and unlimited financial resources from U.S. trade unions and Chinese Americans who many believe are fronting Beijing’s interests.
The local media issue is particularly vexing. There are only a half dozen stations and only one on them has a news person. That station only does a few five-minute news feeds a day. The television station is owned by the government and its news operation is largely a propaganda tool for the governor, with “newscasters” reading press releases written by the governor’s office. Cable TV is expensive, has little penetration in the market and the one community access channel that did news has gone dark. One newspaper that publishes twice weekly, is a shoe string operation with no news gathering capacity and limited circulation.
That leaves Samoa News, the only privately run daily newspaper in the territory with wide circulation. It also has an on-line presence. But Faleomavaega has that covered. His sister-in-law is an editor and negative coverage of his activities is almost non-existent. There certainly is no negative editorial commentary. This current Taiwan controversy illustrates the point. Since he amended the TRA and caused the backlash, there has been absolutely no coverage of it, despite it being quite newsworthy, especially the fact that he suffered a humiliation at the hands of his colleagues. The readers should know that. That’s part of the way his fitness for public office should be measured.
What doe we get instead? This: http://www.samoanewsonline.com/viewstory.php?storyid=5164&edition=1238839200
Now you see what we face down here. Samoa News not only thinks it is newsworthy to write a story about Faleomavaega’s radio show today but also carries a photograph of him with two adoring reporters from the paper! The boys in his press shop back in Washington will be high-fiving when they read today’s paper and breaking out the champagne and victory cigars again. Got away with another one.
Right now, this blog is about the only way we have to let the people know what their delegate is up to and our on-island readership is not that large either. Bandwidth is slow (we don’t have fiber optic cable yet—but soon) and the phone company has an ISP monopoly. The cost is high so internet penetration is low.
However, that doesn’t mean there is nothing you can do. As you saw if you opened the link above and read the story, you saw that Samoa News provides for on-line comments. So you can use that as a vehicle to complain about the paper carrying non-news like this instead of writing about Faleomavaega’s humiliation in the House, war with the Taipei Times or his past controversies. The editors moderate it so we are skeptical they will carry what you write (we have been blocked in the past) but at least you can see for yourself. You also can try to write to the only independent radio news operation: http://khjnews.solupress.com/. However, as you can see from the list of stories (this is the text of what the anchor reads on the air), the news is pretty much local.
And, of course, to vent your frustration, feel free to continue to comment here and cross post our blog to your own and to others. He can be stop as the blow back from his TRA resolution amendment demonstrates. At some point someone will challenge Faleomavaega for election next year and there is a wealth of ammunition in our blogs to help their research. The public knows hardly any of this. Sad, isn’t it?
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Faleomavaega at War with Taiwan
Although we like to settle disputes here by developing consensus, Faleomavaega has been quite successful through the years using a U.S.-style adversarial and confrontational approach. Perhaps he developed his methods early in his congressional career by watching Bill Clinton, who organized a rapid response team to deal with any political attacks he might suffer on the way to his successful 1992 run for the presidency.
Eni is viewed by many as having a “thin skin,” and typically fires back whenever someone criticizes him publicly for some action he has or has not taken, particularly during campaign seasons. And his counterattacks usually are lengthy diatribes--some would say overkill--laced with invective and personal insults. He has had some memorable feuds with Lorn Cramer (over Eni’s Hanoi toast to Ho Chi Minh), Togiola, Aumua Amata and an especially juicy one with Afimutasi Gus Hannemann, which bordered on abusiveness. Google the names (e.g. Faleomavaega and Hannemann) and you can will see the exchanges that were carried out in public.
His method has worked well for him because the territory’s largest and most influential medium, the Samoa News, which employs his sister-in-law as a top editor, has served as his lap dog over the years, mostly giving Eni the last word in any dispute. Typically, someone will make an accusation, which the News will print and then Eni responds with a lengthy press release or letter to the editor, which the News prints in full. It may last for another cycle but then that is the end of it, with Eni pronouncing the final word. There are several occasions on which the target of Eni’s counter assault has replied a second time but the News has declined to print it.
So Eni, who prides himself in being a seasoned diplomat, can be forgiven for thinking his method will work elsewhere but this time he may have bitten off more than he can chew. As we reported in a previous post, the Taipei Times last month ran in editorial labeled “Faleomavaega: no friend of Taiwan” in which the paper criticized our wandering delegate for attempting to water down a House resolution saluting Taiwan on the 30th anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act.
In a follow up letter to the editor, Eni accused the paper of having a political agenda because the editorial was “anonymous.” Of course, it is well known that most newspaper editorials are not signed because they are intended to reflect the views of the paper, not an individual. But Eni knows that. That’s one of his favorite tactics. He was using the editorial writer’s “anonymity” at as a pretext for charging the paper with having a political agenda, thus attempting to shift the focus away from his unsuccessful effort to dilute the resolution and back onto the paper, so that the Times would be on the defensive. Classic Eni: when you are losing the debate, change the debate.
If this were American Samoa, Samoa News would have curled up into a fetal position and sucked its corporate thumb and that would have been the end of it. But this is Taiwan, a major actor on the world economic and political stages. So, the old adage “Never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel” applies here. Unlike Samoa News, the Taipei Times gave it right back to Faleomavaega in comments that appeared right after his letter, letting him know that his tactics, which one political opponent has labeled a “thumb-in-your-eye” approach, were not welcome in Taipei. And his response set off the blogosphere as well.
Let’s take Eni’s contentions in his letter and measure them against the responses by the Times and by bloggers:
Eni’s letter: I am writing in response to your recent editorial (“Faleomavaega: No friend of Taiwan,” March 25, page 8). No name is attached to the editorial, which suggests that either the author or your newspaper has its own political agenda.
Times response: The March 25 article Congressman Faleomavaega refers to was a Taipei Times editorial and therefore carried no byline.
Foreigner in Formosa Blog (FFB): A brief list of OTHER papers which print unattributed editorials: the New York Times, the Washington Post, the National Review, the Wall Street Journal, and Taiwan's China Post. Conspiracy theorists in congressmen's offices: You may begin connecting the dots . . . now.
Eni: . . . one might conclude that your newspaper stands in opposition to the will of your people [the Taiwanese], who voted in 2008 for a change in Administration and for a more honest government.
FFB: Heh. The Taiwanese may indeed have voted for a government which they thought was more honest. What they received however, was a president who is described (by his own media DEFENDERS) as a liar who would say anything to get elected. By the by, I see from a recent post by Tim Maddog over at Taiwan Matters! that Taiwanese president Ma Ying-jeou's approval rating is currently floundering below the 30% mark, while his Chinese Nationalist Party colleagues in the legislature plumb the depths even further -- below 20%. Let's be generous, and say Taiwan's legislative and presidential branches enjoy 20 and 30% approval ratings, respectively. So, what was that you were saying about, "the will of the people," Mr. Faleomavaega?
Eni: Given that your paper published false reports from Coen Blaauw, executive director of the Formosan Association for Public Affairs (FAPA), on March 21 and again on March 26, in which he twisted the truth about my involvement with the 30th anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), and also given that your newspaper never bothered to contact my office for a response to his untruthful comments, one might conclude that your newspaper stands in opposition to the will of your people, who voted in 2008 for a change in Administration and for a more honest government.
Times: William Lowther, the Taipei Times’ Washington correspondent, did not contact Mr Faleomavaega’s office because he spoke directly with Mr Faleomavaega at the end of the subcommittee meeting, together with a number of other reporters.
Eni: In view of the fact that this language is straight from the TRA, why would your anonymous writer, your reporter, or Mr. Blaauw take issue with this language? I submit they take issue because it is their desire to turn the TRA into something it is not. . . . Such an approach is wrong, and our American troops deserve better from FAPA and the Taipei Times.
Times: The Taipei Times has no connection with FAPA, though we do occasionally run opinion pieces by FAPA personnel. These pieces do not necessarily represent the views of the Taipei Times.
Eni: Prior to the Subcommittee’s markup, Chairman Howard Berman and Ranking Member Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of the Foreign Affairs committee agreed to the changes I offered, as did the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, Mr. Manzullo, and the bill’s author. All other Subcommittee members agreed to the language by unanimous consent.
Times: Mr Faleomavaega’s claim that changes he made to the resolution had full backing from fellow committee members cannot be sustained in light of the reversal and, in substance, repudiation by committee members of the amendments on the floor of the House of Representatives, as we reported on March 26. Nor does Mr Faleomavaega refer to his most contentious amendment to the resolution: replacing the words “the cornerstone of” with “vital to” in the sentence “[Congress] reaffirms its unwavering commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act as the cornerstone of United States relations with Taiwan.”
Eni: The TRA came into existence only after the United States established diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China. Since 1979, US policy regarding Taiwan has remained unchanged. The Joint Communiques, together with the Taiwan Relations Act, are the foundation of our One China policy, which implies, as Republican President Ronald Reagan once said, that “the Taiwan question is a matter for the Chinese people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to resolve.” Every US President since 1979 has stood by this assertion. As Senator Richard Lugar, Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee in 2001, said, “For many years, successive US administrations have affirmed that there is one China and that the people on Taiwan and the people of China should work out a plan for peaceful unification.”
Times: Mr Faleomavaega seems confused about the content of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA). Nowhere does the TRA imply, for example, that Taiwan and China “should work out a plan for peaceful unification.” These words from Senator Lugar reflected and still reflect the policy preferences of certain politicians, but they derive no authority from the TRA. Three years after Lugar made these comments, then-secretary of state Colin Powell made a similar comment, which he later retracted.
Taiwan Matters Blog (TMB): Yes, Lugar said "unification" , but the fact behind the US' policies is that the word should be "resolution." Actually, that same CRS Report for Congress which quotes Lugar ("China/Taiwan: Evolution of the 'One China' Policy — Key Statements from Washington, Beijing, and Taipei") states this quite clearly: President Reagan's 1982 statement on arms sales to Taiwan declared that "the Taiwan question is a matter for the Chinese people, on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, to resolve." Moreover, "settlement" or "resolution" — not stated as "unification" — of the Taiwan question is left open to be peacefully determined by both sides. Big difference. What does Faleomavaega know about what's "better for the people of Taiwan"? Not a damn thing, apparently.
Eni: The TRA is not a platform for independence, as they would like it to be, and the American people, as well as the young people on Taiwan, deserve to know the truth about the history of the TRA.
Times: Mr Faleomavaega says “the TRA is not a platform for independence.” The wording of the TRA does not support independence or unification. The key expression is “peaceful means” in determining Taiwan’s future.
You can read Faleomavaega’s amazingly combative and insulting letter in its entirety here: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2009/03/31/2003439824
Links to previous stories are provided and readers also can navigate to the various bloggers to get the full text of their comments.
Now we just wait to see what Eni’s next move is. If this were our local media, we could expect another blast from Washington. But because it is Taiwan, there may be silence. And if there is, you know it’s because the full committee chairman, Howard Berman, called him in and told him to cool it or lose his travel allowance. Now, that is something that really would get Eni’s attention.
Eni is viewed by many as having a “thin skin,” and typically fires back whenever someone criticizes him publicly for some action he has or has not taken, particularly during campaign seasons. And his counterattacks usually are lengthy diatribes--some would say overkill--laced with invective and personal insults. He has had some memorable feuds with Lorn Cramer (over Eni’s Hanoi toast to Ho Chi Minh), Togiola, Aumua Amata and an especially juicy one with Afimutasi Gus Hannemann, which bordered on abusiveness. Google the names (e.g. Faleomavaega and Hannemann) and you can will see the exchanges that were carried out in public.
His method has worked well for him because the territory’s largest and most influential medium, the Samoa News, which employs his sister-in-law as a top editor, has served as his lap dog over the years, mostly giving Eni the last word in any dispute. Typically, someone will make an accusation, which the News will print and then Eni responds with a lengthy press release or letter to the editor, which the News prints in full. It may last for another cycle but then that is the end of it, with Eni pronouncing the final word. There are several occasions on which the target of Eni’s counter assault has replied a second time but the News has declined to print it.
So Eni, who prides himself in being a seasoned diplomat, can be forgiven for thinking his method will work elsewhere but this time he may have bitten off more than he can chew. As we reported in a previous post, the Taipei Times last month ran in editorial labeled “Faleomavaega: no friend of Taiwan” in which the paper criticized our wandering delegate for attempting to water down a House resolution saluting Taiwan on the 30th anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act.
In a follow up letter to the editor, Eni accused the paper of having a political agenda because the editorial was “anonymous.” Of course, it is well known that most newspaper editorials are not signed because they are intended to reflect the views of the paper, not an individual. But Eni knows that. That’s one of his favorite tactics. He was using the editorial writer’s “anonymity” at as a pretext for charging the paper with having a political agenda, thus attempting to shift the focus away from his unsuccessful effort to dilute the resolution and back onto the paper, so that the Times would be on the defensive. Classic Eni: when you are losing the debate, change the debate.
If this were American Samoa, Samoa News would have curled up into a fetal position and sucked its corporate thumb and that would have been the end of it. But this is Taiwan, a major actor on the world economic and political stages. So, the old adage “Never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel” applies here. Unlike Samoa News, the Taipei Times gave it right back to Faleomavaega in comments that appeared right after his letter, letting him know that his tactics, which one political opponent has labeled a “thumb-in-your-eye” approach, were not welcome in Taipei. And his response set off the blogosphere as well.
Let’s take Eni’s contentions in his letter and measure them against the responses by the Times and by bloggers:
Eni’s letter: I am writing in response to your recent editorial (“Faleomavaega: No friend of Taiwan,” March 25, page 8). No name is attached to the editorial, which suggests that either the author or your newspaper has its own political agenda.
Times response: The March 25 article Congressman Faleomavaega refers to was a Taipei Times editorial and therefore carried no byline.
Foreigner in Formosa Blog (FFB): A brief list of OTHER papers which print unattributed editorials: the New York Times, the Washington Post, the National Review, the Wall Street Journal, and Taiwan's China Post. Conspiracy theorists in congressmen's offices: You may begin connecting the dots . . . now.
Eni: . . . one might conclude that your newspaper stands in opposition to the will of your people [the Taiwanese], who voted in 2008 for a change in Administration and for a more honest government.
FFB: Heh. The Taiwanese may indeed have voted for a government which they thought was more honest. What they received however, was a president who is described (by his own media DEFENDERS) as a liar who would say anything to get elected. By the by, I see from a recent post by Tim Maddog over at Taiwan Matters! that Taiwanese president Ma Ying-jeou's approval rating is currently floundering below the 30% mark, while his Chinese Nationalist Party colleagues in the legislature plumb the depths even further -- below 20%. Let's be generous, and say Taiwan's legislative and presidential branches enjoy 20 and 30% approval ratings, respectively. So, what was that you were saying about, "the will of the people," Mr. Faleomavaega?
Eni: Given that your paper published false reports from Coen Blaauw, executive director of the Formosan Association for Public Affairs (FAPA), on March 21 and again on March 26, in which he twisted the truth about my involvement with the 30th anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), and also given that your newspaper never bothered to contact my office for a response to his untruthful comments, one might conclude that your newspaper stands in opposition to the will of your people, who voted in 2008 for a change in Administration and for a more honest government.
Times: William Lowther, the Taipei Times’ Washington correspondent, did not contact Mr Faleomavaega’s office because he spoke directly with Mr Faleomavaega at the end of the subcommittee meeting, together with a number of other reporters.
Eni: In view of the fact that this language is straight from the TRA, why would your anonymous writer, your reporter, or Mr. Blaauw take issue with this language? I submit they take issue because it is their desire to turn the TRA into something it is not. . . . Such an approach is wrong, and our American troops deserve better from FAPA and the Taipei Times.
Times: The Taipei Times has no connection with FAPA, though we do occasionally run opinion pieces by FAPA personnel. These pieces do not necessarily represent the views of the Taipei Times.
Eni: Prior to the Subcommittee’s markup, Chairman Howard Berman and Ranking Member Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of the Foreign Affairs committee agreed to the changes I offered, as did the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, Mr. Manzullo, and the bill’s author. All other Subcommittee members agreed to the language by unanimous consent.
Times: Mr Faleomavaega’s claim that changes he made to the resolution had full backing from fellow committee members cannot be sustained in light of the reversal and, in substance, repudiation by committee members of the amendments on the floor of the House of Representatives, as we reported on March 26. Nor does Mr Faleomavaega refer to his most contentious amendment to the resolution: replacing the words “the cornerstone of” with “vital to” in the sentence “[Congress] reaffirms its unwavering commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act as the cornerstone of United States relations with Taiwan.”
Eni: The TRA came into existence only after the United States established diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China. Since 1979, US policy regarding Taiwan has remained unchanged. The Joint Communiques, together with the Taiwan Relations Act, are the foundation of our One China policy, which implies, as Republican President Ronald Reagan once said, that “the Taiwan question is a matter for the Chinese people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to resolve.” Every US President since 1979 has stood by this assertion. As Senator Richard Lugar, Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee in 2001, said, “For many years, successive US administrations have affirmed that there is one China and that the people on Taiwan and the people of China should work out a plan for peaceful unification.”
Times: Mr Faleomavaega seems confused about the content of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA). Nowhere does the TRA imply, for example, that Taiwan and China “should work out a plan for peaceful unification.” These words from Senator Lugar reflected and still reflect the policy preferences of certain politicians, but they derive no authority from the TRA. Three years after Lugar made these comments, then-secretary of state Colin Powell made a similar comment, which he later retracted.
Taiwan Matters Blog (TMB): Yes, Lugar said "unification" , but the fact behind the US' policies is that the word should be "resolution." Actually, that same CRS Report for Congress which quotes Lugar ("China/Taiwan: Evolution of the 'One China' Policy — Key Statements from Washington, Beijing, and Taipei") states this quite clearly: President Reagan's 1982 statement on arms sales to Taiwan declared that "the Taiwan question is a matter for the Chinese people, on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, to resolve." Moreover, "settlement" or "resolution" — not stated as "unification" — of the Taiwan question is left open to be peacefully determined by both sides. Big difference. What does Faleomavaega know about what's "better for the people of Taiwan"? Not a damn thing, apparently.
Eni: The TRA is not a platform for independence, as they would like it to be, and the American people, as well as the young people on Taiwan, deserve to know the truth about the history of the TRA.
Times: Mr Faleomavaega says “the TRA is not a platform for independence.” The wording of the TRA does not support independence or unification. The key expression is “peaceful means” in determining Taiwan’s future.
You can read Faleomavaega’s amazingly combative and insulting letter in its entirety here: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2009/03/31/2003439824
Links to previous stories are provided and readers also can navigate to the various bloggers to get the full text of their comments.
Now we just wait to see what Eni’s next move is. If this were our local media, we could expect another blast from Washington. But because it is Taiwan, there may be silence. And if there is, you know it’s because the full committee chairman, Howard Berman, called him in and told him to cool it or lose his travel allowance. Now, that is something that really would get Eni’s attention.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
House Colleagues Smack Down Eni
In Congress, committee and subcommittee chairmen are kings who usually get their way on legislation under the jurisdiction of their panel. Whenever there is controversy, the House leadership usually tries to work it out quietly to save embarrassing a colleague. But that is not always the case.
Less than 24 hours after Faleomavaega amended a bipartisan resolution supporting Taiwan on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), the full House reversed the wandering delegate and restored the resolution to its original language, thus delivering a stinging blow to a senior colleague.
Read all about it here in the Taipei Times. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2009/03/26/2003439425
Most people here on island are unlikely to learn about this humiliation to Eni because Samoa News, where Eni's sister-in-law is a top editor, is not likely to report it. They will wait for a press release from Eni's office and, of course, that press release will not be written. But anyone who has access to the Internet--which means all of you reading this--needs only Google "Faleomavaega" and "Taiwan" and click on "news" and "blogs." This story is all over the news and blogosphere, with some bloggers outright labeling Eni as a lapdog for the Communist Chinese.
Those blogs that follow Taiwan issues are quick to note that this is not the first time Faleomavaega has been awkward in his approach to Taiwan issues. One blogger wrote "Faleomavaega has a history of klutziness on Taiwan issues. I've blogged on Faleomavaega's service to Beijing previously in a post on this Nelson Report that includes a very uninformed letter from him on the Taiwan-China issue. It's a shame that a person in an important policymaking position has picked the wrong side in the struggle for democracy.
Another wrote: Good work FAPA (Formosan Association for Public Affairs). It just goes to show that vigilance and effort will be rewarded and proves to the shoulder-shruggers, the nay-sayers, the historical relativists and the capitulationists that YES WE CAN make a difference!. But why oh why is the Democrat's (Eni's) record on Taiwan so abysmal?
What particularly miffed Taiwan supporters was Eni's decision to delete the word "cornerstone" from the resolution. Taiwan views the TRA as the cornerstone of U.S.-Taiwan relations, while Beijing would prefer Washington to view three U.S.-PRC communiques as the cornerstone of U.S. "One-China" policy.
On learning about Faleomavaega's actions, FAPA launched a campaign to get the word “cornerstone” put back into the resolution. FAPA alerted members of the Congressional Taiwan Caucus to the significance of the change, members of FAPA's professionals group sent hundreds of e-mails protesting the change and association officials talked directly to influential Foreign Affairs Committee officials.
As a result, the resolution was changed back to its original wording and, to send Eni an unmistakable message of rebuke, several House members deliberately used “cornerstone” in their Floor remarks of support. To complete Eni's humiliation, the chairman of the Full Committee, fellow Democrat Howard Berman (D-CA), offered the revised resolution himself and said “I am confident that the Taiwan Relations Act will remain the cornerstone of our relationship with Taiwan.”
When this year's Congressional power ratings are released, do not expect Eni to move up any notches.
Less than 24 hours after Faleomavaega amended a bipartisan resolution supporting Taiwan on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), the full House reversed the wandering delegate and restored the resolution to its original language, thus delivering a stinging blow to a senior colleague.
Read all about it here in the Taipei Times. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2009/03/26/2003439425
Most people here on island are unlikely to learn about this humiliation to Eni because Samoa News, where Eni's sister-in-law is a top editor, is not likely to report it. They will wait for a press release from Eni's office and, of course, that press release will not be written. But anyone who has access to the Internet--which means all of you reading this--needs only Google "Faleomavaega" and "Taiwan" and click on "news" and "blogs." This story is all over the news and blogosphere, with some bloggers outright labeling Eni as a lapdog for the Communist Chinese.
Those blogs that follow Taiwan issues are quick to note that this is not the first time Faleomavaega has been awkward in his approach to Taiwan issues. One blogger wrote "Faleomavaega has a history of klutziness on Taiwan issues. I've blogged on Faleomavaega's service to Beijing previously in a post on this Nelson Report that includes a very uninformed letter from him on the Taiwan-China issue. It's a shame that a person in an important policymaking position has picked the wrong side in the struggle for democracy.
Another wrote: Good work FAPA (Formosan Association for Public Affairs). It just goes to show that vigilance and effort will be rewarded and proves to the shoulder-shruggers, the nay-sayers, the historical relativists and the capitulationists that YES WE CAN make a difference!. But why oh why is the Democrat's (Eni's) record on Taiwan so abysmal?
What particularly miffed Taiwan supporters was Eni's decision to delete the word "cornerstone" from the resolution. Taiwan views the TRA as the cornerstone of U.S.-Taiwan relations, while Beijing would prefer Washington to view three U.S.-PRC communiques as the cornerstone of U.S. "One-China" policy.
On learning about Faleomavaega's actions, FAPA launched a campaign to get the word “cornerstone” put back into the resolution. FAPA alerted members of the Congressional Taiwan Caucus to the significance of the change, members of FAPA's professionals group sent hundreds of e-mails protesting the change and association officials talked directly to influential Foreign Affairs Committee officials.
As a result, the resolution was changed back to its original wording and, to send Eni an unmistakable message of rebuke, several House members deliberately used “cornerstone” in their Floor remarks of support. To complete Eni's humiliation, the chairman of the Full Committee, fellow Democrat Howard Berman (D-CA), offered the revised resolution himself and said “I am confident that the Taiwan Relations Act will remain the cornerstone of our relationship with Taiwan.”
When this year's Congressional power ratings are released, do not expect Eni to move up any notches.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Eni Embarrasses American Samoa over Taiwan
At a time when Governor Togiola is working fervently to increase Taiwan interest in doing business with American Samoa, Faleomavaega appears to be continuing to do his best to sabotage U.S. relations with the Asian island nation. In the previous Congress, he enraged Taipei officials by opposing the U.S. sale of F-16 fighter jets to the government and now he is leading the charge to weaken U.S.-Taiwan ties under the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA).
The respected and influential Taipei Times on March 25 published an editorial headlined “Faleomavaega: no friend of Taiwan” in which the delegate was accused of making changes in a resolution offered by 18 of his colleagues “that would attempt to weaken application of the TRA.” Faleomavaega has visited Taiwan countless times over the years including once when he chose to be part of an election observation team there rather than return to American Samoa following a devastating hurricane.
The Times noted that this is not the first time he has tried to loosen U.S. ties with Taiwan. In addition to the F-16 issue, he opposed wording in a separate resolution on Taiwan that passed the House Committee on Foreign Affairs in February last year and the full House in March. According to the Times, his position “revealed shocking ignorance of the U.S. stance on Taiwan from someone who is in a position to frustrate House efforts such as the TRA anniversary resolution. More disturbingly, it sounded like the rambling of an official from Beijing.”
This should come as no surprise from someone who in Hanoi just a little over a year ago would toast Vietnamese Communist dictator Ho Chi Minh’s leadership. Inasmuch as it is very unlikely this editorial will pass muster at Samoa News, where Faleomavaega’s sister-in-law is a top editor, you can read the full text here:
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2009/03/25/2003439322
The respected and influential Taipei Times on March 25 published an editorial headlined “Faleomavaega: no friend of Taiwan” in which the delegate was accused of making changes in a resolution offered by 18 of his colleagues “that would attempt to weaken application of the TRA.” Faleomavaega has visited Taiwan countless times over the years including once when he chose to be part of an election observation team there rather than return to American Samoa following a devastating hurricane.
The Times noted that this is not the first time he has tried to loosen U.S. ties with Taiwan. In addition to the F-16 issue, he opposed wording in a separate resolution on Taiwan that passed the House Committee on Foreign Affairs in February last year and the full House in March. According to the Times, his position “revealed shocking ignorance of the U.S. stance on Taiwan from someone who is in a position to frustrate House efforts such as the TRA anniversary resolution. More disturbingly, it sounded like the rambling of an official from Beijing.”
This should come as no surprise from someone who in Hanoi just a little over a year ago would toast Vietnamese Communist dictator Ho Chi Minh’s leadership. Inasmuch as it is very unlikely this editorial will pass muster at Samoa News, where Faleomavaega’s sister-in-law is a top editor, you can read the full text here:
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2009/03/25/2003439322
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