On
Syria,
Civil Rights
Official Tells
ICP War Takes
from Poor,
Haiti
Echo
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
September 18
-- While votes
in the US
Congress on
military
action on
Syria were
averted for
now by the US
- Russia deal
struck
in Geneva,
Washington is
still abuzz
with different
views of just
what happened.
Inner
City Press on
Tuesday night
asked Hilary
O. Shelton,
the director
of
the National
Association
for the
Advancement of
Colored
People's
Washington
office, what
he thought of
Syria.
He
said that
finding ways
to avert engaging
in war is
always the
best policy,
war should
always be
reserved as
the absolute
last option.
In addition to
the loss of
human life,
money and
resources
spent on war
is taken away
from pressing
basic human
needs and
programs of
the poor in
the US. He
recalled the
"Iraqi war
supplemental
in its first
year under the
Bush administration
of $125
billion." He
also
recounted
being asked
under
President Bill
Clinton if the
US should
invade Haiti.
No, he said,
and went to
the White
House to make
the point.
Instead,
the
US sent Colin
Powell, Sam Nunn
and Jimmy
Carter to
negotiate.
Haiti was (and
is) a poor
country, he
said, that
didn't need an
American
military
invasion.
Shelton
authorized
the use of
what he said,
asking only
that it be
clear that
it is not the
official
position of
the NAACP,
founded in
Niagara,
Canada 140
years ago and
instrumental
in civil
rights
legislation
since,
including
voting rights
which he
credited for
stopping or
pausing the
bombing of
Syria.
Syria
is not as poor
as Haiti, but
it is unclear
at least to
Inner City
Press if more
violence, or arming
Al Nusra or
ISIS, is the
answer. Senator
John McCain,
speaking
Tuesday at the
Council on
Foreign
Relations,
views it
differently.
He
said President
Obama should
not have taken
the question
to Congress
but rather
simply done
it, and with
the usual
"blow-back"
afterward. The
positions
could not be
more
different.
Watch this
site.
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