4-06-05, 9:14 am

The Bush administration's recent State Department Country Reports on Human Rights criticized a number of countries for failing to protect racial and ethnic minorities from discrimination, women and children from discrimination and violence, or to protect the rights of workers to organize unions.

The State Department purported to uphold the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a basic definition of human rights and condemned violations of the principles codified in that document.

When other countries or international entities hold a mirror to injustice occurring in the US, the Bush administration denounces those entities as doing so for political reasons.

For example, in early March, China released a record of human rights violations in the US. Using mostly US-based sources, China's report documented at great length racial discrimination, sexism, violence, neglect of children, poverty, unequal access to health care, an election system fraught with corruption, violations of workers' rights, and other serious flaws in the US social fabric that result in doubts about US democracy, but more importantly, great hurt, even death, for millions of Americans every day.

Instead of accepting responsibility for these problems, promising to work sincerely for a better society, and proposing legislative initiatives and campaigns to effect change, the Bush administration, in typical fashion, dismissed the report and blustered about its commitment to solving these problems.

Let's look at the reality.

The Bush administration's most notable 'successes' in any area of US life have been passing tax cuts for the rich and getting us into a war based on fabrications, manipulations, and fear-mongering.

Meanwhile, as the Children's Defense Fund has shown, President Bush and the Republicans have blocked numerous legislative efforts to protect children from poverty and lack of access to health insurance, violence and neglect. They, in fact, have slashed educational, anti-poverty, and health care programs. About 1 in 6 US children lives in poverty, according to the US Census Bureau.

A promised effort to close the gender gap in wages and to remove discrimination against women on the job hasn't materialized. In fact, the GOP and the president's silence on documented cases of massive gendered discrimination in hiring and promotions and infamous extra exploitation at Wal-Mart signals their true feelings on these matters. Women earn about 80 cents to every dollar men earn.

In other areas of social life, the Bush and the Republicans' attempt to define one group of people constitutionally as inferior by exclusion from certain social rights and consequent privileges – the ban on a gay marriage – marks the first time in the modern era that a movement has sought to write inequality into our ruling document.

Overturning a woman's constitutionally protected right to control her body and reproductive system would violate basic principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The Bush administration blocked the right of workers to organize when he dismantled the union that protected the rights of federal workers during the formation of the Department of Homeland Security. He, no doubt, supports – at least has said nothing against – the fiats of Republicans governors in Missouri and Indiana to dissolve unions of state employees whom the State Department Country Reports say – at least when they live in other countries – have the right to organize.

Without a doubt, these workers would receive Bush's attention if they lived in China or Venezuela.

The Bush administration's vocal opposition to hate crimes legislation that would mandate special attention to violent crimes motivated by racism, anti-Semitism, xenophobia, homophobia and sexism indicate a severe failure on the part of the president to protect the rights of minorities and other non-privileged members of US society.

On civil rights and protections for ethnic and racial minorities from discrimination, about the most significant things the administration has undertaken are a failed effort to overturn affirmative action policies through its support for anti-affirmative action lawsuits and appointments of Republican Party loyalists to the US Commission on Civil Rights who view civil rights protections against racial discrimination, including affirmative action, as antiquated and will likely use the prestige of that body to try to undermine protections. Meanwhile, no initiatives – half-hearted or sincere – have been forthcoming to expose or reverse the documented institutional racism that pervades the criminal justice system, especially the use of the death penalty. Calls for a moratorium on the death penalty based partially on the racially biased manner in which it is used have fallen on deaf ears.

Again, silence and inaction reveal and define the Bush administration's and Republican Party's true feelings on these matters.

The issue of racial profiling is another area that the Bush administration has taken great pains to ignore even as it remains a signature feature of racial injustice in the United States. It is an ongoing daily fact of life for millions of racial and ethnic minorities that undermines their quality of life and threatens their health and very lives.

It is an anti-democratic cancer on US society that can be treated with the proper intervention that, to this date, the Bush administration has ignored.

Racial profiling is receiving renewed attention from the international community as the American Civil Liberties Union has delivered a short report to the UN Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) at that body's current 61st session in Geneva, Switzerland.

The report describes racial profiling as 'sanctioned bias' that is the basis for 'the unequal treatment of racial minorities at every stage of the [US] criminal justice continuum.' Racial profiling is defined as 'a discretionary decision by law enforcement officials to target a person not because he or she has committed a crime, but because of a person's skin color.' This practice 'treats race as evidence of a crime.'

Since race or skin color do not in fact constitute objective evidence of crime, the practice represents a systematic abuse of racial minorities as well as a widespread habit of ignoring criminal or illegal activity conducted by people who do not fit a racial profile.

The ACLU report describes the failure to deal with and reverse the practice as a violation of the US' 'international legal obligations aimed at eliminating racism and racial discrimination.'

The report provides several studies as evidence and condemns the practice of targeting African Americans as criminals, people of Arab descent (or people who appear to be of that heritage) as 'terrorists,' and Latinos as likely violators of US immigration laws.

The report recommends the UNCHR appoint a special representative to write a report on the practice of racial profiling in the US and demands that the US government fulfill its obligations to abolish the practice.

The Bush administration's failure to take steps against this deeply rooted racist practice exposes its habit of churning out 'human rights reports' that annually criticize other countries for what it is: cynical and politically motivated.

If the US really supports the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as the foundational document for upholding human rights, it should apply it internally and not simply use its principles as a weapon to gain political advantage in the international arena.

As it stands, this double standard continues to isolate the US internationally and makes a mockery of its claim to be a leading voice for democracy in the world.



--Joel Wendland is managing editor of Political Affairs and can be reached via e-mail at jwendland@politicalaffairs.net.