Briefing on U.S. Preparations for Relief Efforts for Burma VIDEO

Director of Foreign Assistance Henrietta H. Fore

Briefing on U.S. Preparations for Relief Efforts for Burma FULL STREAMING VIDEO Briefing by USAID Administrator and Director of Foreign Assistance Henrietta H. Fore and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID); Director of the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance Ky Luu

ADMINISTRATOR FORE: Good morning, everyone. Let me start with a few comments on Burma and the Tropical Cyclone Nargis. It is a tragedy of enormous proportions. We continue to offer our deepest condolences to the people of Burma and to those who’ve lost loved ones in Tropical Cyclone Nargis. The President made a point that I think needs underscoring. It is that the Burmese regime needs to let international assistance come in to help the Burmese people.

The United States Agency for International Development has allocated $3.5 – pardon me – $3.25 million in initial assistance to date. This is initial assistance, let me underline that, for this relief effort. The assistance will be allocated by the USAID Disaster Assistance Response Team, what we call DART. It is currently prepositioned in Bangkok and awaiting permission to enter Burma. We are urgently requesting visas.

The Burmese state media is reporting that the cyclone has killed approximately 23,000 persons with an additional 42,000 that are missing. These figures remain unconfirmed at this time and our experience is that these numbers will rise. Reports of a higher number of deaths, injuries and missing persons only increases our concerns and our desire to provide assistance to those who are in greatest need.

We are all very concerned because there is also torrential rains forecast for this area. According to the UN Office of the Coordinator for Humanitarian Assistance, OCHA, the most urgent needs are: plastic sheeting, water purification tablets, cooking sets, mosquito nets, emergency health kits, food, and fuel supplies. Some assistance is starting to get in, but it is a trickle. It is not enough. It needs to have a greater size and a greater speed. So we are urging the Burmese regime to grant full access to the affected areas to international humanitarian relief teams and to nongovernmental organizations so that they can help and provide assistance to those who are most in need.

We are poised and ready to make a significant contribution, but we need a very large coordinated international assistance effort. It is a time when we need that directed by international relief coordinators who have experience in the field. There are many international tragedies and this one needs to be contained at this time. There’s a link to the global food crisis; this Irrawaddy River delta region is a major region for the growing of rice, so it has a link in terms of this region, may not be able to provide rice into the world markets.

We encourage Americans who wish to assist the people of Burma to make cash donations to reputable organizations who are currently working on the ground in the disaster region. For information, I suggest going to interaction.org website. Nothing will get there faster than by giving to these nongovernmental organizations and others. The latest information and updates from USAID can be found by visiting the USAID.gov website, but the American people stand ready to help. Thank you.

MR. GALLEGOS: I appreciate that. Thank you. Now, for the rest of the briefing, we have the Director of the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance Ky Luu. He will be – he’ll be making a brief statement and then he’ll be taking questions and answers.

MR. LUU: Thank you. I will just follow up by saying that, as Administrator Fore said, we are committed, we are prepared, we have a DART that is now currently prepositioned in Bangkok. Our DART team leader has been engaged in all of the interagency standing committee briefings that are taking place there. There’s been outreach to our NGO partners and to our UN partners.

Again, with the initial contribution of $3.25 million, it is going to be allocated initially in the following manner: a million dollars has been committed to the American Red Cross. This will go towards the purchase and procurement and distribution of non-food items. We had initially provided $250,000, which was made available to the embassy. That money was made available to our UN partners, to World Food Program -- to UNHCR, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, and to the World Food Program.

We are in discussions with operational partners who are currently on the ground in order to make sure that the funding that could be made available will have an immediate impact. The problem that the entire international community is facing right now is access. What is available in terms of capacity in-country is not adequate to be able to respond to a disaster of this magnitude. So again, we urge the government of – the regime of Burma to open up access to all humanitarian actors. Thank you.

QUESTION: Have you all made a policy decision yet on whether or not you will give more aid if the DART team is not allowed in, or whether it will be okay with you if a UN assessment, some kind of an independent team can go in and check? Is your – are additional contributions dependent on the DART team going in or not?

MR. LUU: The manner with which the U.S. Government provides humanitarian assistance is that it’s needs-based. What the DART does for us is it allows us an operational platform, an operational presence in the affected region in order to coordinate, in order to communicate with partners to best effectively target our assistance. What the DART team does in a chaotic environment is help us to be able to identify what the needs are. So, it expedites and it facilitates our funding stream. It’s not a policy issue. So therefore, if we were getting information from reliable operational partners that we could verify, again, that’s how we are able to make and base our funding decisions. It’s based upon needs, it’s based upon evidence at the field level.

QUESTION: Well – so, yes or no?

MR. LUU: Well, if the UNDAC teams and other teams were able to come in, and we know these partners and we work with them and they’re able to identify what the gaps are, and these gaps are not being met, we are prepared to be able to provide additional assistance. So, the DART team really is made up of these disaster experts and they coordinate and they work with our other colleagues.

QUESTION: Right, but I guess – I think you just answered it, but I want to make sure. The bottom line is, though, you’d like to have the DART go in, but if it doesn’t go in, you’re not going to cut off – are you --

MR. LUU: That's correct. The bottom line is the DART's presence helps us make informed decisions and it helps us be able to get the resource out quicker. Without the DART on the ground or without other operational partners, it's very difficult at this point in time to tell you exactly what the conditions are on the ground: how many people are impacted, what are the needs. I mean, we know generically in a typical response what needs to take place; however, on a disaster of this magnitude, in terms of being able to gauge what the infrastructure is, how best to be able to bring in relief supplies, that information has not been made available yet.

QUESTION: Right. And is it still the case that you haven't heard back? They haven't rejected the visas, but they just haven't responded? Is that --

MR. LUU: It's my understanding that as of morning calls with post and others, that we have not heard back one way or another at this stage.

QUESTION: What about the -- there was a U.S. cargo plane, a C-130, that they thought was going to be allowed in. I think in Thailand they were saying, oh, that's going to be allowed in. And then I guess it wasn't. Do you have any update on that, where that plane is or what's happening?

MR. LUU: I don't have an update on it. I know that our colleagues within DOD and post and State and others are discussing this option, as we're discussing any options in terms of being able to bring in relief supplies from any donor nation. I think that's the difficulty that we're faced right now. And the reality is that one flight will make some sort of a difference, in terms of testing the logistics and the ability to be able to move commodities out, but we need a decision made soon. I mean, you know, we're approaching almost a week here when the cyclone hit the impacted areas. And we need to get commodities in as quickly as possible and established in-country logistics in order to move commodities out.

QUESTION: But have they started letting -- there was a report they had started letting UN planes land. Is that right, and can you, perhaps, then just funnel your assistance through UN planes? Would that be --

MR. LUU: It's my understanding that there have been four World Food Program flights that have been approved and cleared. I don't know what the status in terms of when their arrival is. We have heard that, for example, back on Monday, a flight from Thailand had landed with relief supplies. Again, they were not allowed to be able to provide for actual relief teams. And the point here is that you can bring in commodities, but if they're not reaching the impacted areas, if they're not available in terms of warehouse space and logistics, forklifts capacity and trucks and helicopters to be able to bring it out, we may be inundated and create a logjam. So it's -- that's why the DART team and the UNDAC team and other disaster experts, it's very important to have them on the ground right now, not just to carry out assessments, but to establish the infrastructure and order the mechanics of moving supplies out.

QUESTION: Is there a need to position teams around -- on the border not far from the countries to -- if people get -- to come to you if you cannot get there? Is it possible?

MR. LUU: I think that we're all looking at options right now. I can't say that in terms of a cross-border operation at this point in time is something that is high on our priority because the reality is, if you look at where they're positioned, that's really not something that's realistic. So the point being is that we've got to be able to get our team in to be able to get access to the largest impacted population.

QUESTION: Can you give us -- you had mentioned that it's been almost a week since the storm hit. Is there kind of a deadline or a real kind of red line area that you see coming up where the aid really needs to get there before we start seeing more casualties from disease, hunger -- after the storm?

MR. LUU: It's difficult to put a clear timeline on this. But clearly, when you're talking about, let's say disasters that are water-related -- the cyclones, the floods -- what you will find right off the bat is, let's say perhaps, high levels of immediate mortality rates. But you don't see a lot of those who are injured by this walking around. So in that context, with an immediate emergency health intervention, we have some time. However, there are secondary health illnesses -- cholera epidemics and others, water-related borne diseases that we have some time. But the reality is on the health portfolio, I would say maybe it could be two to three weeks. Again, I'd have to check in with our health experts on this.

But what is immediately needed right now is access to clean water, and that is immediate. What is absolutely immediate right now is access to temporary shelter. So these sorts of non-food items, the water sanitization, we don't have time to wait on this. This has to go in. And though some of our operational partners had some in-country stocks, it was more on the level of perhaps for 10,000 beneficiaries. And what we're hearing from others is that, you know, you're talking about an overall population in the five states of about 24 million people. There could be anywhere from 1.5 million who will need immediate assistance. So what is available in-country right now is inadequate to be able to deal with the catastrophe.

QUESTION: There's been some talk about -- I mean, I know this is more of a political decision, but in terms of, like, what you can do in terms of getting aid in, there's been some talk about just kind of forcing the aid through, doing airlifts, you know, if the government won’t give the visas and let you get on the ground. Would that help you in any way, like, even if you could do, like, targeted kind of pin-drop food drops, things like that? Is that something that’s being considered? Would that help you, or it’s really not the kind of infrastructure that you would need to get the aid where it needs to be?

MR. LUU: Anything that might have a positive impact is being looked at and is being discussed. Air drops -- again, here you have to have the in-country infrastructure in order to be able to distribute the supplies. You have to be able to communicate to beneficiaries that air drops are occurring. And therefore, it’s not the most efficient manner in terms of providing relief assistance and, in the end, it may create more harm than anything else. So our point is that, yes, we’re looking at it, but the immediate needs are for open access for the current existing operational partners and for the regime in order to open up to provide for additional relief workers to get on the ground.

QUESTION: Just a quick follow-up. What is -- what do they -- is the regime telling you in terms of why they’re not letting you in?

MR. LUU: I’d have to defer that to my State Department colleagues. What I do know is that, you know, on the humanitarian side, this is what we’re planning on in our discussions with our NGO partners and our UN colleagues.

QUESTION: Are you in touch with any kind of similar counterparts in Burma on the government side? I mean, does the government even have any kind of agency like USAID, kind of -- obviously, it wouldn't be as big a scope, but are you talking kind of to your aid counterparts on the ground there?

MR. LUU: The closest and probably the most viable option right now is the local Red Cross, and we are in discussions with the International Federation of the Red Crescent Movement in Geneva as well as our American Red Cross colleagues in terms of assessing their capacity and how to get resources to them. That’s the -- at least from our humanitarian perspective, that’s the open line of communications that we’re currently having.

QUESTION: Well, if they don’t allow U.S. flights, are you in touch with the UN, working with the UN, or India or China, with the neighboring countries there, or do you have any other options at the last if they don’t allow because more and more people will die of hunger and, as you said, many other diseases? You have any other forceful option other than this?

MR. LUU: Well, I think if you look at who has access, I think we’re all very similarly situated here in terms of our ability to be able to not just bring in relief supplies but bring in staff. And there are coordination meetings that are taking place at the -- in Bangkok, and that does include both UN and other donor colleagues, and this is being discussed.

As far as other discussions, that is taking place. Again, you’d have to -- I’d have to defer to our State Department colleagues to be able to tell you in terms of at what level and what’s being discussed.

QUESTION: Have you, by any chance, heard anything about your colleague Jon Brause’s visit to North Korea for discussions on the U.S.’s plan for food aid to North Korea?

MR. LUU: I have not been in discussions with Jon since this occurred, so I’d have to -- again, we can get back to you with regard to that.

MR. GALLEGOS: There’ll be a briefing at 1 o'clock this afternoon.

QUESTION: Okay.

QUESTION: A group of senators today called for USAID to evaluate which organizations on the ground might be best able to overcome the political obstacles to deliver aid in what -- one way, either USAID or -- obviously, USAID -- and try to break the logjam that way. Is there anything going on in that regard?

MR. LUU: We know who the current existing operational partners are and we are in discussions with them right now in terms of being able to provide them with assistance. So that, as I said, is the quickest avenue that we have to have an impact without having the DART team or without having a large UNDAC team on the ground.

That said, we’re hoping that other operational partners are able to get access, because the reality is that those existing infrastructure and staff that they have in country are limited. They’ve been limited in terms of their ability for movement. They’ve been limited in terms of their ability to get out to the impacted area. They’ve been limited in their ability to be able to bring in additional resources. So on the one hand, we are reaching out to the existing operational partners in country. We’re also reaching out to other partners who may not have an existing operations, but if the conditions are such that they opened up, they are able to come in and ramp up programs relatively quickly.

QUESTION: What are the NGOs you are working with who have access to Burma?

MR. LUU: For example, World Vision is on the ground. Save the Children is an operational partner that’s currently there. Pact is on the ground. Our UN colleagues, for example, World Food Program, UNHCR, UNICEF. That’s just a short list. But again, it is a short list, and even then they don’t have enough staff in country to be able to do what they need to do.

QUESTION: Have you guys -- what have you sort of learned or what are you studying from the tsunami response as far as how you’re operating? I remember during the tsunami it was the U.S., Australia, Japan. I think India created this tsunami core group that was pretty unified in how they were responding and they didn’t go through the UN. They just kind of went. Is that something you’re studying as far as a response for this, as kind of setting up some real body between the countries surrounding Burma as far as how to respond?

MR. LUU: We’re looking at close coordination with other donor countries, but I think that the biggest difference here is not only in terms of the size and the scope -- I mean, if you go back to the tsunami here, it impacted, I think, 13 countries. But within hours, within days of the tsunami, the governments had very much opened up access. If you look at the situation in Indonesia, where – within Banda Aceh up at that point, there weren’t many operational partners, whether it was UN or NGOs. And within two days, they did allow access and that access is the key.

We have to be able to come in and we have to verify what the conditions are in order to coordinate. Right now, the coordination that’s taking place is, yes, we have some countries that are pledging resources, we have other countries that are noting that they have standby capacity. But unless and until we have some real, credible field-driven assessments, we’re in a coordination phase outside of the country and that really does not have an immediate impact on the victims of the cyclone.

QUESTION: What’s the status of the U.S. military ships that were on maneuvers and are they being diverted? I know it’d take three or four days, I guess, to get there, but --

MR. LUU: I’d have to defer the specifics – details on that, to our DOD colleagues.

QUESTION: Can I go back to your answer to a question earlier about the – on the air drop idea? Are you – are you saying that it is being – it is being considered, that -- drops of food and other supplies without the government’s permission?

MR. LUU: Everything within the law is being considered at this point in time.

QUESTION: Is that legal?

MR. LUU: Pardon me?

QUESTION: Is that legal?

MR. LUU: To be able to drop without --

QUESTION: Yeah.

MR. LUU: I’d have to – again, you know, whether you look at the UN mandate, I think they’re – the French are looking at and others. I can’t tell you what the legal ramifications are. I can say that if we were given permission to go in, that we would do so. If, let’s say, we were only given permission to be able to drop off food, again, that is something that we would do.

QUESTION: Are you talking about the responsibility to protect (inaudible)?

MR. LUU: That’s correct.

QUESTION: So it is being -- has that been done before?

MR. LUU: The responsibility to protect – I think it’s a kind of a recent idea here. What I was talking about in terms of air drops would be on the mechanics, all we could talk about in terms of planning. In terms of access and what that means, in terms of the legal and international ramifications, again, I’d have to defer to our State Department colleagues. But in terms of planning for it and what it might look like and what the resources would be required and how we might be able to plan for it in-country, as I said, any and all options are being planned. What, actually, we’ll be able to implement will be driven by many things, first of all, in terms of access.

QUESTION: Yeah, but are you aware of this being – of that kind of thing being done previously without permission of the host government?

MR. LUU: You know, again, I’d have to look at it, but it’s my understanding that that was what was utilized with regard to Kosovo. But again, I’d have to go back and defer to others who are much more well-versed on this. I can only really discuss in terms of the mechanics and the operations in terms of what it might look like.

QUESTION: But on Kosovo, you’re talking about without the permission of the Serb Government, which – I mean, there was a dispute, you know, there was a --

MR. LUU: I believe that that’s where it was first, I mean, discussed in the international platform. Again, I can only discuss in terms of what’s being looked at for this current implementation plan and strategy and we are planning the operations.

QUESTION: Okay.

QUESTION: Do you think this is all politics from the military dictatorship, sir?

MR. LUU: Pardon me?

QUESTION: Is this politics, do you think, military dictatorship is playing?

MR. LUU: I don’t understand the question.

QUESTION: Do you think the military dictators here are playing any kind of politics?

MR. LUU: Again, you know, I can only talk and address the humanitarian aspects.

QUESTION: Because of the U.S. (inaudible)?

MR. LUU: We would hope that politics do not come into play. We would hope that with the size and scale of this crisis, that the focus is on the victims and the focus is on being able to allow access and allow our operational partners to be able to deliver life-saving assistance.

MR. GALLEGOS: Okay. We have time for one more.

QUESTION: Yeah. You said a few minutes ago that some of your operational partners had some stocks and you said only enough on the order of 10,000, were you talking about stocks of water, stocks of food, or stocks of what?

MR. LUU: For example, UNHCR had stocks of blankets, stocks of water, stocks of plastic sheeting. Again, for all of them, it was on the magnitude of enough for 10,000 beneficiaries. So it is absolutely urgent for us to be able to not only provide funding for them to restock, but the ability for them to actually bring in the relief commodities. But bringing in commodities is just one component of this. You have to have the basic infrastructure to move it out.

QUESTION: Is that the universe of the stuff there that you know about? I mean, is that the most? I mean, enough there for --

MR. LUU: That’s what we know of at this point in time, yes.

QUESTION: But what about like, the Red Cross? They had something there, didn’t they?

MR. LUU: They did have some supplies which have already been distributed. And I believe that the IFRC has released an appeal for about 6 million Swiss francs for the restocking of those supplies. And, you know, the point, as we’re saying, is that there’s not enough stocks, staff or capacity in country at this point in time to deal with this catastrophe.

MR. GALLEGOS: All right. Thank you, guys.

QUESTION: I’m sorry, one more question. Well, why not just give everything through the UN and allow the UN to distribute everything? Why does it have to go through U.S. transport planes or U.S. assets? Why not give everything to the UN and have them -- you know -- through the World Food Program, through all their agencies, seeing as how their planes are being allowed in now?

MR. LUU: Well, not all their planes are being allowed in.

QUESTION: Well, there are several at this point.

MR. LUU: They have received, what we’ve been told, permission for four flights and for food. They are similarly situated, as are our other colleagues, in terms of being able to bring in staff. As I said here, the UNDAC team, they were only allowed to grant visas for four staff, so – the point being is if there’s a large infrastructure that we can support, we will look at that option. But the point is that it shouldn’t be narrowed in scope. Everybody has to become involved and we hope and urge that the regime will allow the access to take place as soon as possible.

MR. GALLEGOS: Thank you.

MR. LUU: Thank you.

2008/363 Released on May 8, 2008 Press Conference Office of the Spokesman Washington, DC. May 8, 2008

Tags: Relief Efforts for Burma and Henrietta H. Fore or Ky Luu and Tropical Cyclone Nargis

President Bush Attends Council of the Americas PODCAST VIDEO

President George W. Bush delivers remarks to the Council of the Americas Wednesday, May 7, 2008, at the Department of State in Washington, D.C. President Bush highlighted his policies in the Western Hemisphere, emphasizing the importance of congressional approval of the Colombia Free Trade Agreement. President Bush said, "Once implemented, the Colombia Free Trade Agreement would immediately eliminate tariffs on more than 80 percent of American exports of industrial and consumer goods." White House photo by Chris Greenberg

President Bush Attends Council of the Americas FULL STREAMING VIDEO Department of State Washington, D.C. PODCAST OF THIS ARTICLE THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all. Please be seated. Bill, thank you for the kind introduction. Thanks for giving me a chance to come by and see that the Secretary of State's dining room is a lot better than the President's dining room. (Laughter.) I'm honored to be here. I'm pleased to be with the Council of Americas again. I appreciate what you do to promote personal and economic freedom throughout the region, throughout the Americas.

I appreciate your strong concern about the need for liberty to be spread -- liberty in forms of government and liberty in forms of economies.

I am honored to be here with the Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, better known in the neighborhood as Señorita Arroz. (Laughter.) I'm pleased to be with Carlos Gutierrez, the Secretary of Commerce; Susan Schwab, the U.S. Trade Representative. Thrilled to be here with Susan Segal, the President and CEO of the Council of Americas; a dear family friend, former member of the Cabinet in 41, Robert Mosbacher; Mack McLarty, as well -- people who care a lot about the region. Thank you for joining us here. I'm also pleased to be here with ministers, representatives, ambassadors from the governments of Canada, Colombia, Mexico and Peru -- honored you all are here.

The foundation of good foreign policy is good relations with your neighbors. A peaceful and secure neighborhood is in the interest of the United States of America. And so I want to talk to you about the hemisphere we share, the challenges we face, and the aggressive work that the United States is doing to help make the Americas a place of hope and liberty.

In recent decades, there have been positive developments in Latin America. Countries have moved away from an era of dictatorships, era of civil strife. Unfortunately, today some countries in the region are seeing a resurgence of radicalism and instability. And one nation in the region remains mired in the tyranny of a bygone era -- and that is Cuba.

Yesterday I had a fascinating opportunity to speak with a leading Cuban dissident, a former political prisoner, and a wife of a man who is held in a Cuban prison simply because he expressed his belief that all people should live in a free society. Video-conferencing is one of the great wonders of the 21st century, and to be able to sit in the White House and talk to these three brave souls in Havana was a inspiring moment for me. It reminded me about how much work the United States has to do to help the people in Cuba realize the blessings of liberty. It also reminded me of a couple of things: One, that there's an eternal truth when it comes to freedom, that there is an Almighty, and a gift of that Almighty to every man, woman and child, whether they be American, Cubano, or anywhere else, is freedom; and that it's going to take the courage and determination of individuals such as the three I met with to help inspire the island to embrace freedom.

The Cuban government recently announced a change at the top. Some in the world marveled that perhaps change is on its way. That's not how I view it. Until there's a change of heart and a change of compassion, and a change of how the Cuban government treats its people, there's no change at all. The regime has made empty gestures at reform, but Cuba is still ruled by the same group that has oppressed the Cuban people for almost half a century. Cuba will not be a land of liberty so long as free expression is punished and free speech can take place only in hushed whispers and silent prayers. And Cuba will not become a place of prosperity just by easing restrictions on the sale of products that the average Cuban cannot afford.

If Cuba wants to join the community of civilized nations, then Cuba's rulers must begin a process of peaceful democratic change. And the first step must be to release all political prisoners. They must respect the human rights in word and in deed. And they must allow what the Cuban people have desired for generations -- to pick their own leaders in free and fair elections. This is the policy of the United States, and it must not change until the people of Cuba are free. (Applause.)

We face other challenges in the hemisphere, as well. I'm deeply concerned about the challenge of illicit drug trade. First, I fully understand that when there is demand, there will be supply. And the United States of America is implementing a strategy to reduce -- a comprehensive strategy to convince our people to stop using illegal drugs. I talk to my counterparts all the time in the region and I talk about how we can work together -- and I'll explain some strategies here in a minute -- but I also remind them that so long as the United States uses illegal drugs, the drug dealers will find a way to get their products here.

We made some progress on reducing demand. Since 2001, the rate of drug use among the young has dropped by 24 percent. Young people's use of marijuana is down by 25 percent. The use of ecstasy has dropped by more than 50 percent. Methamphetamine use is down by 64 percent. Overall it's estimated that 860,000 fewer young people in America are using drugs today than when we began. But obviously we still have a lot of work to do. And so my commitment to our friends in the neighborhood is, the United States will continue to implement its comprehensive strategy to do our part to reduce demand for illegal drugs.

Secondly, we're working to intercept illegal drugs before they reach our citizens. Every day the men and women of the DEA, the Coast Guard, the Border Patrol and other law enforcement organizations are working tirelessly to intercept drugs, to stop money laundering, and to bust the gangs that are spreading this poison throughout our society. We've had some success. We've seized record amounts of cocaine coming into the United States. Last year these efforts resulted in a significant disruption of the availability of cocaine in 38 major cities. We still have more work to do.

And a final leg of our strategy is this: We will work with our partners, Mexico and the countries of Central America, to take on the international drug trade. I am deeply concerned about how lethal and how brutal these drug lords are. I have watched with admiration how President Calderón has taken a firm hand in making sure his society is free of these drug lords. And the tougher Mexico gets, the more likely it is that these drug families and these kingpins will try to find safe haven in Central America.

And that is why I committed my administration to the Merida Initiative. It's a partnership, a cooperative partnership with Mexico and Central America that will help them deal with the scourge of these unbelievably wealthy and unbelievably violent drug kingpins. And I want to work with Congress to make sure that, one, they fully pass our request in the upcoming supplemental debate, and also remind members of Congress that the strategy that we have put forth is a strategy designed with the leadership of the Central American countries, as well as with Mexico. It's a strategy designed to be effective. And so when Congress passes our supplemental request, they also got to make sure that they implement the strategy we proposed in full.

Another challenge is promoting social justice in the region. Nearly one out of four people in Latin America lives on $2 a day. Children never finish grade school. Mothers have trouble finding a doctor. In the age of growing prosperity and abundance, this is a problem that the United States must take seriously. As the most prosperous country in the world, the United States is reaching out to help our partners improve the lives of their citizens.

Social justice requires access to decent health care. And so we're helping meet health care needs in some of the most remote parts of Latin America, primarily by using the United States military's medical personnel to treat local citizens.

I'll never forget going to Guatemala and seeing the clinics run by our troops. America is a compassionate country. We're plenty strong when we need to be. But our military has provided unbelievably good care for a lot of people who have never seen health care before. The missions last year provided treatment for 340,000 individuals in 15 countries. And this year, a new series of humanitarian assistant missions will treat an additional 320,000. And it's so important when people think of America and think of the neighborhood that they understand social justice is at the forefront of our agenda.

Social justice requires access to decent education, as well. And since 2004, the taxpayers of the United States have provided more than $300 million for education programs throughout the region, with a special emphasis, a special focus on rural and marginalized populations.

Last year as well, the Secretary and I announced a new partnership for Latin America youth, to help train thousands of young people in the Americas with their English, and to provide opportunity to study here in the United States. And the reason why is simple: We want people in our neighborhood to have the skills necessary to take advantage of the opportunities of the 21st century. It's in the interest of the United States that we promote good health policies and good education policies.

Social justice also requires institutions that are fair, effective and free of corruption. It's hard to have a hopeful society when leadership steals the taxpayers' money. It's hard to have a hopeful place when the people aren't comfortable with the nature of government. And so we'll continue our bilateral aid, and I'm proud of the amounts of money we're spending in the region. But we've also changed the way that we're providing aid by insisting upon rules of governance, rule of law, the education -- the investment in education and health of its people, and governments to embrace marketplace economies.

And we do this what's called -- through what's called the Millennium Challenge Account. It is a new way to say that, yes, we're going to provide taxpayers' money, but we expect something in return from the governments that we help. I don't think it's too much to ask a government that receives U.S. aid to fight corruption. Matter of fact, I think it's a request that's long overdue. I don't think it's too much to ask a government that we help to invest in the health and education of their children. Nor do I think it's too much to ask for a government to accept marketplace economics.

The Millennium Challenge Account has invested $930 million in our region thus far to assist the countries of El Salvador, Guyana, Honduras, Nicaragua, Paraguay and Peru. Let me talk about just some of the initiatives to give you a sense for the types of programs we're talking about.

In Honduras, the United States is providing assistance to nearly 1,300 farmers so they can develop their farmland and provide for their families. In Nicaragua, we've helped small farmers and entrepreneurs increase their productivity in rural communities. In Paraguay, we're working to -- with local leaders to reduce the cost of starting new businesses.

See, the whole purpose is to encourage enterprise, infrastructure that will help people get goods to markets; to provide the capacity -- increase the capacity of these countries to be able to provide hope for their people. This is a really good program, and the Congress needs to fully fund it as they debate the appropriations bills this year.

The Millennium Challenge Account is one way to promote prosperity, but perhaps the most -- not "perhaps" -- the most effective way is through trade. Trade brings increased economic opportunities to both the people of Latin America and the people of the United States.

Congress recognized this opportunities, and Congress took a look at whether or not we ought to have free trade agreements in our neighborhood, and they started doing so with Peru. And the bill, thankfully -- the trade bill with Peru passed by a large bipartisan majority. It's a good agreement. It's good for Peru. It also happens to be good for the United States. And now my call on Congress is to take that same spirit by which they passed the Peruvian free trade agreement and do the same thing for Colombia and Panama.

About 17 months ago, the United States signed a free trade agreement with Colombia. Ever since, my administration has worked closely with Congress to seek a bipartisan path for considering this agreement. I understand trade votes are hard. And that's why we continually reached out with -- to Congress. We've had more than 400 consultations, meetings and calls. We've led trips to Colombia for more than 50 members of Congress. We worked closely with congressional leaders from both parties. We responded to concerns over labor and environmental standards by including some of the most rigorous protections of any trade agreement in the history of the United States. We have bent over backwards to work with members from both parties on the Hill.

And despite this, Congress has refused to act. One month ago I sent the bill -- I sent the bill to implement the agreement to the Congress. Yet the Speaker chose to block it instead of giving it an up or down vote that the Congress had committed to. Her action is unprecedented. It is extremely unfortunate. I hope the Speaker is going to change her mind. I hope you help her to change her mind. If she doesn't, the agreement is dead, and this will be bad for our workers, our businesses, and it will be bad for America's national security.

Approving the agreement would strengthen our economy. Today almost all of Colombia's exports enter the United States duty-free. Yet American products exported to Colombia face tariffs of up to 35 percent for non-agricultural goods, and much higher for many agricultural products. Think about that. They export into the United States duty-free, and we don't have the same advantage. I would call that a one-sided economic agreement.

Failure to pass the free trade agreement, therefore, is making it much harder to sell our products into Colombia. To try to put this in perspective for you, this weekend we reached an unfortunate milestone when the tariffs imposed on U.S exports to Colombia reached an estimated $1 billion since the free trade agreement was signed. There's a -- that's one billion good reasons why the United States Congress ought to pass this bill. Passing the agreement we could create the -- (applause).

Members of Congress need to think about this. Once implemented, the Colombia free trade agreement would immediately eliminate tariffs on more than 80 percent of American exports of industrial and consumer goods. Many American exports of agriculture and construction equipment, aircraft and auto parts, and medical and scientific equipment would immediately enter Colombia duty-free. So would farm exports like high-quality beef, and cotton, and wheat, and soybeans, and fruit. And eventually, the agreement would eliminate all tariffs on U.S. goods and services.

Opening markets is especially important during this time of economic uncertainty. Last year, exports accounted for more than 40 percent of America's total economic growth. Forty percent of the growth was as a result of goods and services being sold from the United States into foreign markets. With our economy slowing, it seems like to me that we should be doing everything possible to open up new markets for U.S. goods and services. More than 9,000 American companies, including 8,000 small and mid-sized firms, export to Colombia. And approving this agreement, opening up markets for their goods and services, would help them increase sales, would help them grow their businesses, and would help them pay good-paying jobs.

If you're interested in work in America, if you're interested in economic vitality, you ought to be doing everything you can to make it easier for U.S. companies to be selling overseas.

And finally, approving this agreement is a urgent national security priority. Colombia is one of our strongest allies in the Western Hemisphere. I admire President Uribe a lot. He is courageous. He shares our values. He is a strong, capable partner in fighting drugs and crime and terror. The Colombia government reports, since 2002 kidnappings in Colombia have dropped 83 percent, terrorist attacks are down 76 percent, murders have dropped by 40 percent. He's got a strong record of doing what he said he was going to do.

And despite the progress, Colombia remains under intense pressure in the region. It faces a continuing assault from the terrorist group known as FARC, which seizes hostages and murder innocent civilians. Colombia faces a hostile and anti-American neighbor in Venezuela, where the regime has forged an alliance with Cuba, collaborated with FARC terrorists, and provided sanctuary to FARC units.

President Uribe has stood strong. He has done so with the assurance of American support. Congress's failure to pass the Colombia free trade agreement has called this support into question. President Uribe told members of Congress that approving this agreement is one of the most important ways that America can show our unwavering commitment to Colombia. Congressional leaders need to send a message that we support this brave and courageous leader, and that we will not turn our back on one of our most steadfast allies. (Applause.)

Yesterday I met with the President of Panama. I assured him our efforts to get the Panamanian trade bill passed will be just as vociferous and vigorous as our efforts to get the Colombia trade bill passed. Congress must understand they have a chance to spread prosperity in our neighborhood; they have a chance to support friends in our neighborhood. And there's no better way to express that friendship than to support the Colombia free trade agreement, the Panamanian free trade agreement, and while they're at it, to send a clear message around the world that the South Korean free trade agreement is good for the U.S. economy as well.

The ties between the people of the United States and the people of Latin America are important to our country. They're important to our prosperity, and they're important to the national security interest of the country. We share a deep bond, a bond between friends and a bond between neighbors. And because of this bond, the United States will, and must, remain committed to making sure that Latin America is a place of opportunity, a place of hope, a place of social justice, a place where basic necessities, like health care and education, are not too much for any child to dream about. Or a place where poverty gives way to prosperity, and a place, above all, where freedom is the birthright of every citizen.

I want to thank you for taking on the cause. I thank you for your vision; I thank you for your steadfast support of doing what's right in our neighborhood. And it's been my honor to come and share some thoughts with you. God bless. (Applause.)

END 1:37 P.M. EDT. For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary May 7, 2008

Tags: President Bush and Council of the Americas or Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice

John McCain on Judicial Philosophy Wake Forest PODCAST

Remarks By John McCain on Judicial Philosophy, REAL AUDIO Running time is 36:18 U.S. Senator John McCain delivered the following remarks as prepared for delivery at Wake Forest University, in Winston-Salem, NC, May 6, 2008 at 10:00 a.m. EDT:

Thank you, Ted, and thank you all very much. Dr. Hatch, I'm grateful for your invitation to this great university. And Senator Richard Burr, thank you for that warm welcome to North Carolina and to Wait Chapel. I'm honored to be here, and I brought along a friend. I'm sure you'll recognize him -- my pal, Senator FredThompson of Tennessee.

We appreciate the hospitality of the students and faculty of Wake ForestUniversity, and especially during exams. I know exam week involves some tough moments, likewhen you're up at 3:00 a.m. and have to choose between studying or watching one of Fred's old movies. Most of the students here look confident and ready, so you need no advice from me as final exams draw near. But for those of you who might be feeling a slight sense of panic coming on, all I can say is that a few bad grades don't have to be end of the road -- so just give it your best and move on. An undistinguished academic record can be overcome in life, or at least that is the hope that has long sustained me.

Your kind invitation brings me here as a candidate for president of the United States, and anyone in that pursuit has plenty of promises to make and to keep. When it's all over, however, the next president will be compelled to make just one promise, in the same words that 42 others have spoken when the moment arrived. The framers of our Constitution had a knack for coming right to the point, and it shows in the 35-word oath that ends with a pledge to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution itself.

This is what we require and expect of every president, no matter what the agenda or loyalties of party. All the powers of the American presidency must serve the Constitution, and thereby protect the people and their liberties. For the chief executive or any other constitutional officer, the duties and boundaries of the Constitution are not just a set of helpful suggestions. They are not just guidelines, to be observed when it's convenient and loosely interpreted when it isn't. The clear powers defined by our Constitution, and the clear limits of power, lose nothing of their relevance with time, because the dangers they guard against are found in every time.

In America, the constitutional restraint on power is as fundamental as the exercise of power, and often more so. Yet the framers knew that these restraints would not always be observed. They were idealists, but they were worldly men as well, and they knew that abuses of power would arise and need to be firmly checked. Their design for democracy was drawn from their experience with tyranny. A suspicion of power is ingrained in both the letter and spirit of the American Constitution.

In the end, of course, their grand solution was to allocate federal power three ways, reserving all other powers and rights to the states and to the people themselves. The executive, legislative, and judicial branches are often wary of one another's excesses, and they should be. They seek to keep each other within bounds, and they are supposed to. And though you wouldn't always know it from watching the day-to-day affairs of modern Washington, the framers knew exactly what they were doing, and the system of checks and balances rarely disappoints.

There is one great exception in our day, however, and that is the common and systematic abuse of our federal courts by the people we entrust with judicial power. For decades now, some federal judges have taken it upon themselves to pronounce and rule on matters that were never intended to be heard in courts or decided by judges. With a presumption that would have amazed the framers of our Constitution, and legal reasoning that would have mystified them, federal judges today issue rulings and opinions on policy questions that should be decided democratically. Assured of lifetime tenures, these judges show little regard for the authority of the president, the Congress, and the states. They display even less interest in the will of the people. And the only remedy available to any of us is to find, nominate, and confirm better judges.

Quite rightly, the proper role of the judiciary has become one of the defining issues of this presidential election. It will fall to the next president to nominate hundreds of qualified men and women to the federal courts, and the choices we make will reach far into the future. My two prospective opponents and I have very different ideas about the nature and proper exercise of judicial power. We would nominate judges of a different kind, a different caliber, a different understanding of judicial authority and its limits. And the people of America -- voters in both parties whose wishes and convictions are so often disregarded by unelected judges -- are entitled to know what those differences are.

Federal courts are charged with applying the Constitution and laws of our country to each case at hand. There is great honor in this responsibility, and honor is the first thing to go when courts abuse their power. The moral authority of our judiciary depends on judicial self-restraint, but this authority quickly vanishes when a court presumes to make law instead of apply it. A court is hardly competent to check the abuses of other branches of government when it cannot even control itself.

One Justice of the Court remarked in a recent opinion that he was basing a conclusion on "my own experience," even though that conclusion found no support in the Constitution, or in applicable statutes, or in the record of the case in front of him. Such candor from the bench is rare and even commendable. But it was not exactly news that the Court had taken to setting aside the facts and the Constitution in its review of cases, and especially in politically charged cases. Often, political causes are brought before the courts that could not succeed by democratic means, and some federal judges are eager to oblige. Politicians sometimes contribute to the problem as well, abdicating responsibility and letting the courts make the tough decisions for them. One abuse of judicial authority inspires more. One act of raw judicial power invites others. And the result, over many years, has been a series of judicial opinions and edicts w andering farther and farther from the clear meanings of the Constitution, and from the clear limits of judicial power that the Constitution defines.

Sometimes the expressed will of the voters is disregarded by federal judges, as in a 2005 case concerning an aggravated murder in the State of Missouri. As you might recall, the case inspired a Supreme Court opinion that left posterity with a lengthy discourse on international law, the constitutions of other nations, the meaning of life, and "evolving standards of decency." These meditations were in the tradition of "penumbras," "emanations," and other airy constructs the Court has employed over the years as poor substitutes for clear and rigorous constitutional reasoning. The effect of that ruling in the Missouri case was familiar too. When it finally came to the point, the result was to reduce the penalty, disregard our Constitution, and brush off the standards of the people themselves and their elected representatives.

The year 2005 also brought the case of Susette Kelo before the Supreme Court. Here was a woman whose home was taken from her because the local government and a few big corporations had designs of their own on the land, and she was getting in the way. There is hardly a clearer principle in all the Constitution than the right of private property. There is a very clear standard in the Constitution requiring not only just compensation in the use of eminent domain, but also that private property may be taken only for "public use." But apparently that standard has been "evolving" too. In the hands of a narrow majority of the court, even the basic right of property doesn't mean what we all thought it meant since the founding of America. A local government seized the private property of an American citizen. It gave that property away to a private developer. And this power play actually got the constitutional "thumbs-up" from five m embers of the Supreme Court.

Then there was the case of the man in California who filed a suit against the entire United States Congress, which I guess made me a defendant too. This man insisted that the words "Under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance violated his rights under the establishment clause of the First Amendment. The Ninth Circuit court agreed, as it usually does when litigious people seek to rid our country of any trace of religious devotion. With an air of finality, the court declared that any further references to the Almighty in our Pledge were -- and I quote -- "impermissible." And it was so ordered -- generations of pious, unoffending custom supposedly overturned by one decree out of a courtroom in San Francisco. And now it turns out the same litigant is back for more in the Ninth Circuit, this time demanding that the words "In God We Trust" be forever removed from our currency. I have a feeling this fellow will get wind of my remarks today -- and we're all in for trouble when he hears that we met in a chapel.

In the shorthand of constitutional discourse, these abuses by the courts fall under the heading of "judicial activism." But real activism in our country is democratic. Real activists seek to make their case democratically -- to win hearts, minds, and majorities to their cause. Such people throughout our history have often shown great idealism and done great good. By contrast, activist lawyers and activist judges follow a different method. They want to be spared the inconvenience of campaigns, elections, legislative votes, and all of that. They don't seek to win debates on the merits of their argument; they seek to shut down debates by order of the court. And even in courtrooms, they apply a double standard. Some federal judges operate by fiat, shrugging off generations of legal wisdom and precedent while expecting their own opinions to go unquestioned. Only their favorite precedents are to be considered "settled law," and everything else is fair game.

The sum effect of these capricious rulings has been to spread confusion instead of clarity in our vital national debates, to leave resentment instead of resolution, and to turn Senate confirmation hearings into a gauntlet of abuse. Over the years, we have all seen the dreary rituals that now pass for advice and consent in the confirmation of nominees to our Supreme Court. We've seen and heard the shabby treatment accorded to nominees, the caricature and code words shouted or whispered, the twenty-minute questions and two-minute answers. We have seen disagreements redefined as disqualifications, and the least infraction of approved doctrine pounced upon by senators, their staffs, and their allies in the media. Always hanging in the air over these tense confirmation battles is the suspicion that maybe, just maybe, a nominee for the Court will dare to be faithful to the clear intentions of the framers and to the actual meaning of the Constitution. And then no tactic of abuse or delay is out of bounds, until the nominee is declared "in trouble" and the spouse is in tears.

Of course, in the daily routine of Senate obstructionism, presidential nominees to the lower courts are now lucky if they get a hearing at all. These courts were created long ago by the Congress itself, on what then seemed the safe assumption that future Senates would attend to their duty to fill them with qualified men and women nominated by the president. Yet at this moment there are 31 nominations pending, including several for the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals that serves North Carolina. Because there are so many cases with no judges to hear them, a "judicial emergency" has been declared here by the Administrative Office of U.S. Courts. And a third of the entire Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals is vacant. But the alarm has yet to sound for the Senate majority leadership. Their idea of a judicial emergency is the possible confirmation of any judge who doesn't meet their own narrow tests of party and ideology. They want federal judges who will push the limits of constitutional law, and, to this end, they have pushed the limits of Senate rules and simple courtesy.

As my friend and colleague Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma points out, somehow these very same senators can always find time to process earmark spending projects. But months go by, years even, and they can't get around to voting on judicial nominations -- to meeting a basic Senate duty under our Constitution. If a lobbyist shows up wanting another bridge to nowhere, or maybe even a courthouse with a friend's name on it, that request will be handled by the Senate with all the speed and urgency of important state business. But when a judicial nominee arrives to the Senate -- a nominee to preside at a courthouse and administer justice -- then he or she had better settle in, because the Senate majority has other business and other priorities.

Things almost got even worse a few years ago, when there were threats of a filibuster to require 60 votes for judicial confirmations, and threats in reply of a change in Senate rules to prevent a filibuster. A group of senators, nicknamed the "Gang of 14," got together and agreed we would not filibuster unless there were "extraordinary circumstances." This parliamentary truce was brief, but it lasted long enough to allow the confirmation of Justices Roberts, Alito, and many other judges. And it showed that serious differences can be handled in a serious way, without allowing Senate business to unravel in a chaos of partisan anger.

Here, too, Senators Obama and Clinton have very different ideas from my own. They are both lawyers themselves, and don't seem to mind at all when fundamental questions of social policy are preemptively decided by judges instead of by the people and their elected representatives. Nor have they raised objections to the unfair treatment of judicial nominees.

For both Senator Obama and Senator Clinton, it turned out that not even John Roberts was quite good enough for them. Senator Obama in particular likes to talk up his background as a lecturer on law, and also as someone who can work across the aisle to get things done. But when Judge Roberts was nominated, it seemed to bring out more the lecturer in Senator Obama than it did the guy who can get things done. He went right along with the partisan crowd, and was among the 22 senators to vote against this highly qualified nominee. And just where did John Roberts fall short, by the Senator's measure? Well, a justice of the court, as Senator Obama explained it -- and I quote -- should share "one's deepest values, one's core concerns, one's broader perspectives on how the world works, and the depth and breadth of one's empathy."

These vague words attempt to justify judicial activism -- come to think of it, they sound like an activist judge wrote them. And whatever they mean exactly, somehow Senator Obama's standards proved too lofty a standard for a nominee who was brilliant, fair-minded, and learned in the law, a nominee of clear rectitude who had proved more than the equal of any lawyer on the Judiciary Committee, and who today is respected by all as the Chief Justice of the United States. Somehow, by Senator Obama's standard, even Judge Roberts didn't measure up. And neither did Justice Samuel Alito. Apparently, nobody quite fits the bill except for an elite group of activist judges, lawyers, and law professors who think they know wisdom when they see it -- and they see it only in each other.

I have my own standards of judicial ability, experience, philosophy, and temperament. And Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito meet those standards in every respect. They would serve as the model for my own nominees if that responsibility falls to me. And yet when President Bill Clinton nominated Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsberg to serve on the high court, I voted for their confirmation, as did all but a few of my fellow Republicans. Why? For the simple reason that the nominees were qualified, and it would have been petty, and partisan, and disingenuous to insist otherwise. Those nominees represented the considered judgment of the president of the United States. And under our Constitution, it is the president's call to make.

In the Senate back then, we didn't pretend that the nominees' disagreements with us were a disqualification from office even though the disagreements were serious and obvious. It is part of the discipline of democracy to respect the roles and responsibilities of each branch of government, and, above all, to respect the verdicts of elections and judgment of the people. Had we forgotten this in the Senate, we would have been guilty of the very thing that many federal judges do when they overreach, and usurp power, and betray their trust.

The surest way to restore fairness to the confirmation process is to restore humility to the federal courts. In federal and state courts, and in the practice of law across our nation, there are still men and women who understand the proper role of our judiciary. And I intend to find them, and promote them, if I am elected president.

Harry Truman said that he gave "more thought, more care, and more deliberation" to the selection of judges than nearly any other duty of the office. I will bring that same level of care and caution to my judicial nominations, expecting in return that the Senate will do its own part, and confine itself to the duty of confirming qualified men and women for the courts. The decisions of our Supreme Court in particular can be as close to permanent as anything government does. And in the presidential selection of those who will write those decisions, a hunch, a hope, and a good first impression are not enough. I will not seek the confidence of the American people in my nominees until my own confidence is complete -- until I am certain of my nominee's ability, wisdom, and demonstrated fidelity to the Constitution.

I will look for accomplished men and women with a proven record of excellence in the law, and a proven commitment to judicial restraint. I will look for people in the cast of John Roberts, Samuel Alito, and my friend the late William Rehnquist -- jurists of the highest caliber who know their own minds, and know the law, and know the difference. My nominees will understand that there are clear limits to the scope of judicial power, and clear limits to the scope of federal power. They will be men and women of experience and wisdom, and the humility that comes with both. They will do their work with impartiality, honor, and humanity, with an alert conscience, immune to flattery and fashionable theory, and faithful in all things to the Constitution of the United States.

There was a day when all could enter the federal courthouses of our country feeling something distinctive about them -- the hush of serious business, the quiet presence of the majesty of the law. Quite often, you can still find it there. And in all the institutions of government there is nothing to match the sight of a court of law at its best. My commitment to you and to all the American people is to help restore the standards and spirit that give the judicial branch its place of honor in our government. Every federal court should command respect, instead of just obedience. Every federal court should be a refuge from abuses of power, and not the source. In every federal court in America, we must have confidence again that no rule applies except the rule of law, and that no interest is served except the interest of justice. Thank you very much. ###

Tags: John McCain and Judicial Philosophy or Wake Forest

Mrs. Bush's Statement on Burma VIDEO

Mrs Laura Bush addresses reporters in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room Monday, May 5, 2008 at the White House, on the humanitarian assistance being offered by the United States to the people of Burma in the aftermath of the destruction caused by Cyclone Nargis. White House photo by Shealah Craighead

Mrs. Bush's Statement on Burma FULL STREAMING VIDEO James S. Brady Press Briefing Room 3:05 P.M. EDT MRS. BUSH: Thank you, everybody, for coming out. I just want to make a few comments about Burma. On Saturday, Cyclone Nargis swept through Burma. The storm affected more than 2 million people, and according to the Burmese media, killed thousands. The aftermath has left cities paralyzed, families separated and houses and businesses destroyed. Americans are a compassionate people and we're already acting to provide help. The U.S. has offered financial assistance through our embassy. We'll work with the U.N. and other international non-governmental organizations to provide water, sanitation, food and shelter. More assistance will be forthcoming.

The United States stands prepared to provide an assistance team and much needed supplies to Burma as soon as the Burmese government accepts our offer. The government of Burma should accept this team quickly, as well as other offers of international assistance.

As they cope with this tragedy, the men and women of Burma remain in the thoughts and prayers of many Americans. It's troubling that many of the Burmese people learned of this impending disaster only when foreign outlets -- such as Radio Free Asia and Voice of America -- sounded the alarm. Although they were aware of the threat, Burma's state-run media failed to issue a timely warning to citizens in the storm's path.

The response to the cyclone is just the most recent example of the junta's failure to meet its people's basic needs. The regime has dismantled systems of agriculture, education and health care. This once wealthy nation now has the lowest per capita GDP in Southeast Asia.

Despite the havoc created by this weekend cyclone, as far as we can tell Burma's military leaders plan to move forward with the constitutional referendum scheduled for this Saturday, May 10th. They've orchestrated this vote to give false legitimacy to their continued rule. The proposed constitution was drafted in a flawed process that excluded opposition and some key ethnic groups. It would effectively give the military a veto over any constitutional changes. The constitution would prohibit democracy activists who are current or former political prisoners, including Aung San Suu Kyi, from taking office. To ensure their constitution becomes law, the regime has been intimidating voters and using force against dissidents. Public gatherings have been banned and printed materials may not be distributed without governmental approval.

As the date of the referendum draws near, there's been an increase in arrests of opposition party members and activists. This continues to take place, despite a call from the international community, and most recently from the United Nations Security Council, for Burma's government to ensure its referendum is free, fair and inclusive.

In response to the regime's continued repression, President Bush has instructed the U.S. Treasury Department to freeze assets of Burmese state-owned companies that are held in U.S. banks. This adds to actions last year to expand U.S. sanctions against Burma's regime, and to tighten sanctions against its top leaders. We thank the European Union, Canada and Australia for joining the United States in imposing similar restrictions. And we appeal to China, India, and Burma's fellow ASEAN members to use their influence to encourage a democratic transition.

Burma's ruling generals have had their chance to implement the good government they promised to their people. If it proceeds under current conditions, the constitutional referendum they have planned should not be seen as a step toward freedom, but rather as a confirmation of the unacceptable status quo.

Thank you all very much for giving me a chance to speak. I'm going to leave tomorrow for Crawford, for Jenna's wedding, and I wanted to be able to make a statement about Burma before I left.

So I'm happy to take questions.

Q Mrs. Bush, could you offer us any specifics yet about the scope of the U.S. disaster relief package?

MRS. BUSH: Right now, the earliest part of the relief is money that the embassy already has, that's already there that we can distribute to other NGOs -- the World Food Program, other groups that are on the ground. If they will let our DART team in, then we'll be able to assess what else we can do. And we do have other supplies and commodities in the area -- not in Burma, but close in the area, that would be available soon for help if our DART team can get in and see what they can do.

Q And given your concerns about the ruling government there, are you also worried that any U.S. aid might not get to the people affected?

MRS. BUSH: Well, I'm worried that they won't even accept U.S. aid. And I urge the government to accept aid from the United States and from the entire international community right now, while the needs of their people are so critical.

Q Mrs. Bush, is there any evidence that the sanctions the U.S. and other nations have imposed on the leaders in Myanmar, or Burma, have had an effect?

MRS. BUSH: Only anecdotal. We have heard, and not -- probably can't really confirm -- about some of the leaders who are targeted -- actions that they've taken that make us think they don't like those targeted sanctions on the leaders themselves.

Q Madam, do you have any strong message for the dictatorship, military dictatorship in Burma as far as this democracy and this cyclone is concerned? And do you think they will have a change of heart and minds because of this tragedy?

MRS. BUSH: I hope so. I hope that their will be one good thing that comes out of such huge destruction, and that would be the government's realization that the people of Burma need help and they need more help than they can give them -- or that they've been able to give them.

And the country has just been totally decimated with both education, agriculture -- all of the things that made Burma one of the richest countries in Asia have now been dismantled. And it's very, very important that the regime start to accept both technical help from out of the country and, obviously in this sort of disaster, very -- be able to accept the really basic help that anybody would need, any country would need and any people would need after this kind of disaster.

Q And madam, what message you have for India, what India can do?

MRS. BUSH: Well, I think India can help. India is close, on the border there. I think there are a lot of ways they could help and get help there quickly, and maybe the Burmese government would accept it more readily from the Indian government than they do from the U.S. government.

April.

Q Mrs. Bush, why such an historic interest? This is a first, for a First Lady to come to this podium and talk about a cyclone. Why such a historic interest?

MRS. BUSH: Well, you know I've been interested in Burma for a long time. It started really with an interest in Aung San Suu Kyi and reading her works and just the story of a Nobel Prize winner who's been under house arrest for so long, whose party was overwhelmingly elected in an election and then never able to take office. And so it started with an interest in her, and then just the more I've seen, the more critical I see the need is for the people in Burma to be -- for the world to pay attention to the people of Burma, and for the world to put pressure on the military regime.

Q And a follow-up. What about the issue of sanitation? You talked about that, and dysentery. Could you talk a little bit more about --

MRS. BUSH: Those are the sort of things that international help would be critical for. We don't know, for instance, in the -- people were already talking about the high price of rice. We don't know -- they would have been just in the planting season -- what would happen if this big 12-foot surge of ocean water, salt water comes over the -- what would have been rice-planting ground. We just don't know, but it seems very, very dire. They were all -- already needed the help of the World Food Program, the WFP -- and now they'll need it even more.

And so it's really important for the regime to accept this kind of help to open their doors to all the help, to all of the help the U.N. could give, from U.N. AIDS* to UNICEF -- each one of the international programs that can help, as well as help from every government that is willing to help. And I know there are a lot of governments that are.

Q Why do you think that the government didn't allow the state-run media to post those warnings?

MRS. BUSH: I don't know. I have no idea.

Q Quick follow on that. Do you think that they have blood on their hands for that lack of warning?

MRS. BUSH: Well, I just think it's very, very important -- that we know already that they are very inept; that they have not been able to govern in a way that lets their company -- country, for one thing, build an economy. This is a country that's rich in natural resources. Their natural resources are being depleted as they sell them off, as far as we can tell from the outside, for the financial benefit of the regime itself and not for the good of the people. We know that.

We know these huge forests -- teak and mahogany forests may be being depleted -- that they have. Their gem shows -- last year many American gem countries [sic] and European gem countries [sic] refused to go to the big gem auctions because they didn't want to prop up the government. But we do know that a lot of -- that China, for instance, a lot of Chinese gem buyers did go.

Q Mrs. Bush, the European Union has pledged $3 million. That initial aid offer from the United States is only $250,000.

MRS. BUSH: That's right.

Q If they accept some assistance, how large would the U.S. --

MRS. BUSH: Well, I don't know that. I mean, we'll have to see what it would be, and I can't speak to how large that would be. But I can -- I feel sure that it would be substantial if we can give it. The money that -- the first fund, the first $250,000 from the U.S. government is money that the embassy already has in a fund for something like this, and they can give it immediately to the World Food Program or other NGOs that are meeting the very immediate needs.

If we can get some sort of team in there to assess what the other needs are, then I feel very assured that the United States government will follow with bigger --

Q What have they said?

MRS. BUSH: I don't know that. They haven't said anything, as far as I know.

Q Mrs. Bush, what can you tell us about the President signing legislation in the near future to award Aung San Suu Kyi the Congressional Gold Medal?

MRS. BUSH: The President will sign the legislation tomorrow, the congressional legislation that awards Aung San Suu Kyi the Congressional Medal of Honor.** And I was hoping to be here with him when he did that. I don't think I'll be here because I think I'll be going on tomorrow.

But he will, and I think that's important. I think it's just another way, like the Senate and the House caucuses on Burma, that let the people of Burma know that the United States is standing with them. And we do know that they listen to Radio Free Asia and they listen to Voice of America, and so it's very important to get our message out on those radio stations so that people in Burma know that we are aware of what's happened, and we are very aware of the needs of the people after the cyclone.

Q Do you think that might, though, affect the military junta's willingness to receive aid from the international community, particularly the U.S.?

MRS. BUSH: I hope not. I hope that the military will realize they have to accept aid from everybody they can possibly accept it from. And maybe that will be the something good that can come out of this terrible destruction.

Q Will they let her come to the U.S. to accept the medal?

MRS. BUSH: They might let her come accept; they might not let her ever go back. I don't think she would ever do that, because she couldn't be assured that she could go home. That's why she didn't go see her husband when he was dying in England.

Anything else?

Q Yes. The U.S. only provides a few million dollars in annual humanitarian aid to Myanmar now. Some relief officials have raised concerns that the existing U.S. sanctions plus the sheer lack of trust between the two countries will impede the flow of any significant U.S. aid following the cyclone. And the question is, how is the U.S. government going to balance those two objectives -- the ones of maintaining financial pressure on the junta, and at the same time making sure the cyclone victims aren't victimized once again?

MRS. BUSH: Well, that's the very -- that's always the question when sanctions are part of any sort of pressure that we can put on a government. And in fact that seems to be the only kind of pressure the United States can put on Burma. Certainly we hope that India, for instance, and other countries in the neighborhood can step up if they won't accept aid from the United States.

But I think in front of their own people and in front of the world, if they don't accept aid from the United States and from all the rest of the international community that wants to help the people of Burma, that that is just another way that the military regime looks so cut off and so unaware of what the real needs of their people are.

Okay, one last one.

Q Ma'am, is there any way for the Burmese leaders to salvage the referendum process? Should they scrap it, start from scratch?

MRS. BUSH: Well, I'm not going to give them any advice, but it would be very, very odd I think if they went ahead and held a referendum this Saturday.

Q Madam, all the best for the wedding, Jenna's wedding.

MRS. BUSH: Thank you very much. Thank you.

Q Any chance you'll let us cover it? (Laughter.)

Q No invitation for the White House press?

Q Is it true there is an altar of limestone --

MRS. BUSH: That's right, the President told that this morning on "Good Morning America." This was his idea, to build this beautiful limestone altar, and it's the Texas limestone -- the same that our house is made out of -- from a local quarry, and they're the ones that made it.

Q Is it permanent? (Laughter.)

MRS. BUSH: It's permanent.

Q Is he more nervous or are you?

MRS. BUSH: Neither one of us are nervous. I'm very, very excited. It's a very interesting passage of life when you get to that time in your life when your child, first child is getting married -- and we're getting, for us, our first son. So it's a thrill and we're very happy about it.

Q When some grandchildren come will they be named George --

MRS. BUSH: George or Georgia -- Georgina. Georgette. (Laughter.)

Q President is more excited, or you are more excited?

MRS. BUSH: We're both really, really excited. We're very thrilled, and of course Jenna is so happy and Henry is very happy. And that makes their mother and dad really happy.

Q Why the wedding didn't take place here at the White House?

MRS. BUSH: Well, she just wanted to get married at home. She just feels a lot more comfortable there. And it will be really beautiful. This is the time when the wild flowers are all blooming. And I think it will be a very, very lovely wedding, and it will be very like Jenna and Henry. And of course, that's what we want. We want what she wants.

Q How early Sunday morning is the bike ride the President will -- (laughter.)

MRS. BUSH: Since he probably won't be staying up to dance the last dance, it will probably be early.

Bye, you all. Thank you very much. And thank you so much for covering Burma, and I hope you'll keep watching. Thanks a lot.

END 3:21 P.M. EDT

* Joint U.N. Program on HIV/AIDS

** Congressional Gold Medal

For Immediate Release Office of the First Lady May 5, 2008

Tags: Laura Bush and Burma or cyclone

How people of color, women use Internet, digital media

Caption: In her latest work, Lisa Nakamura focuses on the online visual cultures that people of color and women -- relative newcomers to the Net -- have created. Credit: Photo by L. Brian Stauffer, U. of I. News Bureau. Usage Restrictions: Photo may be used only with stories about the research described in the news release. Please credit: Photo by L. Brian Stauffer, U. of I. News Bureau.

Book focuses on how people of color, women use Internet, digital media Scholars who study visual culture on the Internet always see more than meets the eye, but one professor has widened her scope even more, trying to adjust the ways the rest of us look at race and gender on the Web – and off. In her latest work, Lisa Nakamura focuses on the online visual cultures that people of color and women – relative newcomers to the Net – have created. She argues in her new book, “Digitizing Race: Visual Cultures of the Internet,” that instead of being passive audiences or merely consumers of digital media – as they generally have been portrayed – the newcomers are heavily involved in “grass-roots media production.” In fact, Nakamura, a professor of media and cultural studies at the University of Illinois, argues that non-whites and non-males now use the Internet to “vigorously articulate their own types of virtual community, avatar bodies and racial politics.” “The premise of my book,” she wrote, “is that women and racial and ethnic minorities create visual cultures on the popular Internet that speak to and against existing graphical environments and interfaces online.”

By examining a range of new digital production practices created by minority popular visual cultures on the Web, Nakamura has tried to “give a sense of how this group of users sees, rather than merely how they are seen or represented, what they are making as well as what they are using, what they are doing as well as what they are being.”

Surveys of race and the “digital divide” that fail to measure digital production in favor of access or consumption “cannot tell the whole story, or even part of it,” she wrote.

Nakamura examined racial and gender identity as expressed in contemporary, popular and “under examined” digital media such as pregnancy support Web sites, Instant Messenger avatars, online petitions, music videos and millennial science-fiction films.

In her book, she offers a method for analyzing the Internet’s visual culture in relation not only to older media forms, “but also to a matrix of live cultural practices, identities, geopolitics, and postcolonial, racial and political positions.”

With its emphasis on user-produced digital media by women and people of color, Nakamura’s study is the first to explore a new type of visual culture critique based on close and rigorous readings of the images created by Internet users. For example, she explores:

* Veiled Muslim AIM buddies that are deployed in Instant Messenger and “created by users who participate in a vital youth culture that coalesces around online chat.”

“These avatars kitted out in chadors and DKNY sweaters fill a gap in the available forms of bodily representation that AIM users can find circulating in the world of avatar sharing,” Nakamura wrote. “The tension between the representation of the veil, a sign of privacy and a controversial symbol of female subordination under Islam, and its positioning on a hyperfeminized and overtly displayed cartoon body creates a visual body that works to negotiate the notion of the nation-state in the world of IM embodiment.”

* Pregnant avatars that are used to “adorn” and supplement posts to women’s bulletin boards. These are “collaboratively produced artifacts” of the popular culture of the Internet that address pregnant women’s “socially invisible bodies” in the context of scientific and medical representation.

* Recent online Asian-American petitions to protest retail and media racism, such as those that surrounded Details magazine’s “Gay or Asian” article and Abercrombie and Fitch’s “Two Wongs Don’t Make It White” T-shirt promotion.

Asian-American activists, she wrote, launched online petitions that served to polarize the Asian-American community at least as much as they did to unite it.

“The sites themselves functioned as highly ambivalent responses to issues around the visual culture of race in the United States. The anonymity afforded the petition signers, the persistence of their replies on the site, and the opportunity for users to view them all simultaneously create a space for online discursive play that challenges the notion of race- and ethnicity-based community in the act of creating it.”

The cases Nakamura examined exemplify the efforts of “previously new and previously unexpressive” groups of users who are using the Internet to “actively visualize themselves, their differing races, their complicated genders, their generative and bereft bodies.”

“Yet at the same time, they are performing this cultural work while living in a post-neoliberal age in which race ‘doesn’t matter’; and it has become profoundly unfashionable to be one thing or another, and actively dangerous to signify race or ethnicity in the public sphere.”

According to Nakamura, people of color and women are not as well represented in biennials, zines, independent film and other “expressive forums, much less in mainstream film and media. And all told, their cultural production on the Internet is far from dominant.”

However, she said, a key difference between the Internet and other media forms is that on the Web, the production of a visual culture “expressive of racial and ethnic identity” is potentially available to a much broader group of people.

“We should celebrate the creative interventions of teenage Muslim girls, pregnant women and other users who have appropriated the Internet to create visual images that represent themselves in their bodily particularities such as chadors, pregnant bellies and ultrasound photographs,” said Nakamura, a professor in the Institute of Communications Research.

People of color and women care greatly about how they’re visualized on the Internet.

“They care enough to sign protests about media racism, and when they don’t like what they see, they care enough to sign online petitions and perhaps even to sit down and create new templates, new images of themselves, new databodies that talk back to the dominant.”

While the new activity on the Net is encouraging, it comes with a caveat, Nakamura wrote, because as it evolves, the more it comes to resemble the visual culture of other media and the more it becomes subject to the same issues that “plague the study of minority discourse in all visual cultures.”

“Brave young Arab American women hacking their AIM buddies in their bedrooms are a sentimentally attractive image that fits into a classic narrative of rebellion and resistance against dominant new media cultures,” she wrote.

But the “pesky problem of protest within a system that one is nonetheless employing to frame the protest continues to haunt the study of minority new media cultures.”

“While avatars wearing chadors and DKNY sweaters certainly look different from more mainstream images of American femininity, and in fact contain a wealth of fascinating information that scholars and fans of hybrid cultures will greatly enjoy, they contain exactly the same number of pixels, are formatted in the same file type, and occupy the same amount of space in an IM screen as do all the others.

“Any deviation from this strict industrial norm simply does not work within the program owing to the file protocols of Instant Messenger, protocols that are immutably exacting and resistant to modification owing to technological lock-in and are the direct result of a mature Internet economy and broad user base.”

Put another way, the changes that are possible using the “culture-jamming or hacking” model of new media resistance and critique are “necessarily constrained and limited by the form or ‘system’ that enables them. The continuing monetization of the Internet’s forms and technological apparatuses practically guarantees that this issue will remain a thorny one.” ###

Contact: Andrea Lynn andreal@uiuc.edu 217-333-2177 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Tags: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and people of color or digital media

Freedom Calendar 05/03/08 - 05/10/08

May 3, 1876, Birth of Isaac Leevy, South Carolina African-American Republican who established Lincoln Emancipation Clubs in 1940s to enable African-Americans to vote.

May 4, 1961 - American civil rights movement: The "Freedom Riders" begin a bus trip through the South. sponsored by the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) CORE was co-founded in Chicago in 1942 by James L. Farmer, Jr. In 1968 Farmer ran for U.S. Congress as a Republican and lost to Democrat Shirley Chisholm. However his defeat was not total; the recently elected Republican President, Richard Nixon, offered him the position of Assistant Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare.

May 5, 1983, Hispanic Republican Patricia Diaz Dennis appointed by President Ronald Reagan as first Hispanic woman on National Labor Relations Board; later served as FCC Commissioner under Reagan and as Regent of Texas State University under Gov. George W. Bush.

May 6, 1960, President Dwight Eisenhower signs Republicans’ Civil Rights Act of 1960, overcoming 125-hour, around-the-clock filibuster by 18 Senate Democrats.

May 7, 1990, President George H. W. Bush proclaims first Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month.

May 8, 2003, Speaker Dennis Hastert, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, and other Republican leaders gather at Frederick Douglass National Historic Site, announce $1 million restoration effort.

May 9, 2001, President George W. Bush nominates Miguel Estrada to be first Hispanic to serve on U.S. Court of Appeals for D.C. Circuit; Democrats in Senate successfully filibuster nomination.

May 10, 1866, U.S. House passes Republicans’ 14th Amendment guaranteeing due process and equal protection of the laws to all citizens; 100% of Democrats vote no.

“A healthy republican government must rest upon individuals, not upon classes or sections. As soon as it becomes government by a class or by a section, it departs from the old American ideal.”

Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States

Tags: President Bush and Freedom Calendar or NAACP and Republicans or African-Americans and 13th Amendment or right to vote and Civil Rights or Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass or 40 acres and a mule or Brown v. Board of Education and Martin Luther King or Dred Scott

Presidential Podcast 05/03/08

Presidential Podcast 05/03/08 . Subscribe to Our Podcast feed or online podnova Podcast Channel and receive the weekly Presidential Radio Address in English and Spanish with select State Department Briefings. Featuring full audio and text transcripts, More content Sources added often so stay tuned.

Tags: President Bush and White House radio address or Commerce Department

Bush radio address 05/03/08 full audio, text transcript

bush radio address 05/03/08 full audio, text transcript. President's Radio Address In Focus: Economy

Subscribe to Our Podcast feed or online podnova Podcast Channel and receive the weekly Presidential Radio Address in English and Spanish with select State Department Briefings. Featuring real audio and full text transcripts, More content Sources added often so stay tuned.

THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. This week, the Commerce Department reported that GDP grew at an annual rate of six-tenths of a percent in the first quarter. This rate of growth is not nearly as high as we would like. And after a record 52 months of uninterrupted job growth, April was the fourth month in a row in which our economy lost jobs, although the unemployment rate dropped to five percent.

My Administration has been clear and candid on the state of the economy. We saw the economic slowdown coming, we were up front about these concerns with the American people, and we've been taking decisive action.

In February, I signed an economic growth package to put more than $150 billion back into the hands of millions of American families, workers, and businesses. This week, the main piece of that package began being implemented, as nearly 7.7 million Americans received their tax rebates electronically. Next week, the Treasury Department will begin mailing checks to millions more across the country. And by this summer, it expects to have sent rebates to more than 130 million American households. These rebates will deliver up to $600 per person, $1,200 per couple, and $300 per child.

This package will help American families increase their purchasing power and help offset the high prices that we're seeing at the gas pump and the grocery store. It will also provide tax incentives for American businesses to invest in their companies, which will help create jobs. Most economic experts predict that the stimulus will have a positive effect on the economy in this quarter and even a greater impact in the next. And Americans should have confidence in the long-term outlook for our economy.

While getting more money back in the hands of Americans is a good start, there are several additional steps that Congress needs to take to ease the burdens of an uncertain economy. Americans are concerned about energy prices. To increase our domestic energy supply, Congress needs to allow environmentally safe energy exploration in northern Alaska, expand America's refining capacity, and clear away obstacles to the use of clean, safe nuclear power.

Americans are concerned about rising food prices. Yet, despite this growing pressure on Americans' pocketbooks, Congress is considering a massive farm bill. Instead, they should pass a fiscally responsible bill.

Americans are concerned about making their mortgage payments and keeping their homes. Yet Congress has failed to pass legislation I have repeatedly requested to modernize the Federal Housing Administration that will help more families stay in their homes, reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to ensure they focus on their housing mission, and allow state housing agencies to issue tax-free bonds to refinance sub-prime loans.

Americans are concerned about their tax bills. With all the other pressures on their finances, American families should not have to worry about the Federal government taking a bigger bite out of their paychecks. So Congress should eliminate this uncertainty and make the tax relief we passed permanent.

America is now facing a tough economic period, but our long-term outlook remains strong. This week we saw evidence that our economy is continuing to grow in the face of challenges. This should come as no surprise. No temporary setbacks can hold back the most powerful force in our economy -- the ingenuity of the American people. Because of your hard work and dedication, I am confident that we will weather this rough period and emerge stronger than ever.

Thank you for listening. # # #

For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary May 3, 2008

Tags: President Bush and White House radio address or Commerce Department