Cambodian Buddhist monks look at thousands of skulls on display at the Choeung Ek memorial, some 15 kilometers southwest of Phnom Penh, April 13. (AFP File Photo)

Today (Sunday) is my birthday. April 17 is what’s on my driver’s license and other documents. But I don’t know for sure, and probably never will. All I know is that I was born in Cambodia, sometime during 1970.
In Cambodia, we didn’t celebrate birthdays, so while my mother and father knew the date, I had no reason to remember it. Instead, my early years were marked by joyous events like the New Year, the Water Festival and various Buddhist holidays.
In the early 1970’s, Southeast Asia was full of strife; the Soviet Union, China and the United States were fighting in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. But my earliest years were wonderfully free of war and conflict. My father was a high-ranking military officer, which meant a privileged lifestyle. Our house was filled with food and toys and even had a washing machine and an indoor toilet. I spent my days fighting with my three sisters and spying on my three brothers as they danced to Beatles songs in their bell-bottom pants. We went to school six days a week, and on Sundays, we swam or watched movies at the international youth club in Phnom Penh.
On April 17, 1975, the Communist Khmer Rouge regime took over my country, and my charmed life came to an abrupt end. I remember that day well. I was on the street playing hopscotch with one of my sisters when rows of mud-covered trucks drove by. On the trucks, men in uniforms were yelling into bullhorns, ordering us to leave our homes, telling us that the Americans were going to bomb us and if we didn’t leave we would die. Chaos and fear swept through Phnom Penh. More than two million people were evicted in less than 72 hours. Later, we heard that those who refused to leave were shot dead.
My family was forced to march to a remote village. There we lived without religion, school, music, clocks, radios, movies, television or any modern technology. The soldiers dictated when we ate, slept and worked. Desperate to eliminate any threats, real or perceived, to their plans for the country, the soldiers proceeded to execute teachers, doctors, lawyers, architects, civil servants, politicians, police officers, singers, actors.
While children elsewhere in the world watched TV, I watched public executions. While they played hide-and-seek with their friends, I hid in bomb shelters with mine; when a bomb hit and killed my friend Pithy, I brushed her brains off my sleeve. I will never forget the day they came for my father. They said they needed him to help pull an oxcart out of the mud. As he walked off with the soldiers, I did not pray for the gods to spare his life. I prayed only that his death be quick and painless. I was 7 years old.
My war ended in 1979 when the Vietnamese invaded Cambodia and defeated the Khmer Rouge’s army. But it was too late for the 1.7 million Cambodians killed, almost a third of the country’s population of seven million. Among the victims were my parents and two sisters. My birth date died with them.
Loung Ung, a spokeswoman for the Cambodia Fund
NYTIMES.COM

Question--have you ever heard of Maurice Hilleman? If your answer is No or Who?, join about 99 percent of the American people. He passed away this month in Philadelphia at the age of 85. Here is what the front page New York Times article said about his medical career:
Dr. Maurice R. Hilleman developed vaccines for mumps, measles, chickenpox, pneumonia, meningitis and other diseases, saving tens of millions of lives. Much of modern preventive medicine is based on Dr. Hilleman’s work, though he never received the public recognition of Salk, Sabin or Pasteur. He is credited with having developed more human and animal vaccines than any other scientist, helping to extend human life expectancy and improving the economies of many countries.
The Times quotes Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institutes of Health as saying: “The scientific quality and quantity of what he did was amazing. One can say without hyperbole that Maurice changed the world with his extraordinary contributions in so many disciplines: virology, epidemiology, immunology, cancer research and vaccinology.“ His associates, whom he regularly credited for their contributions, marveled at his artistry in safely producing large quantities of weakened live or dead micro-organisms. Dr. Hilleman credited his skills wryly to growing up on a farm in Montana where he worked as a boy with chickens. Chicken eggs are the fertilizing sites for many vaccines.
There are many fascinating stories about this scientist. Yet almost no one knew about him, saw him on television, or read about him in newspapers or magazines. His anonymity, in comparison with Madonna, Michael Jackson, Jose Canseco, or an assortment of grade B actors, tells something about our society’s and media’s concepts of celebrity; much less of the heroic. This is not a frivolous observation.
Bringing the work of individuals who matter to so many people on the important issues of lives and livelihoods is a prime way of educating the citizenry about important matters. Media trumpeting of Madonna’s latest escapades alerts and motivates the public quite differently than highlighting the frequent breakthroughs of a scientist like Dr. Hilleman.
The former sells records and pulp magazines, the latter keeps the American people more knowledgeable about the critical perils that confront them if recognition and resources are not dedicated to their prevention. Today, in America, there are tens of billions of dollars being spent and misspent on the struggle against stateless terrorists. Despite being warned repeatedly by the Centers for Disease Control and the World Health Organization, the Bush Administration is reacting feebly to the avian flu risks coming from the Far East. Already having taken nearly one hundred lives, should this avian flu mutate with a human virus, a deadly pandemic could sweep the world with tens of millions of fatalities.
It is time to know the names of the scientists already working on this great venture for health and hear them out. Hear ye, media!
Ralph Nader
COMMONDREAMS.ORG

Communist campaign posters saying 'no' to the European Union constitution are shown affixed on a wall at Fontenay-sous-bois near Paris, April 15. (Reutes Photo)

French president, Jacques Chirac’s intervention in support of the European Union’s draft constitutional treaty in Thursday’s televised debate may come to be seen as a turning point, whichever way France votes in the referendum of May 29.
If voters say “yes“, there will be no shortage of presidential aides to hail their boss’s appearance as a decisive event that turned the tide after a month in which more than a dozen opinion polls have predicted a “no“ vote. If they reject the constitution, the debate will be a rich source for analysts seeking deeper explanations for why the French, whose political elites have done so much to shape the EU, have turned against their creation.
For the meeting between 83 young voters and the 72-year-old Mr Chirac exposed a wide gulf between ruler and ruled. Young and old talked past each other. The 18- to 30-year-olds were preoccupied with national issues, such as jobs and public services, while Mr Chirac’s arguments focused on Europe’s role as a power in a multi-polar world.
There is poetic justice in the fact that Mr Chirac came face to face with the problematic nature of referendums in his TV appearance. He could have known in advance that extraneous issues such as high unemployment, the prospect of Turkey’s EU membership and the sheer unpopularity of France’s centre-right administration would be caught up in the campaign. In an ideal world, the constitutional debate should involve none of these issues.
But the confusion of the constitutional treaty in a melee of issues and emotions highlights a wider divide between rulers and ruled in Europe. Put bluntly, the policies, practices and ideas that constitute the EU are failing to deliver what people want.
When the organisation was conceived, it was possible to accept its top-down, elitist nature as one of several trade-offs to assist the noble goals of banishing war and shoring up the western side of a continent divided by the Iron Curtain. Fifty years on, today’s European citizens feel none of the geopolitical imperatives of the founding fathers. Nor can many see advantages from the policies of greater integration--or “deepening“ the EU--and enlargement, or “widening“, that inspired the intermediate generation of leaders such as Germany’s Helmut Kohl and France’s Fran�ois Mitterrand.
Instead, today’s enlarged 25-member EU is a cause of concern for many in France, Germany, the Netherlands and Italy. There are the spectres of Anglo-Saxon free-market liberalism and “social dumping“, represented by low-cost labour from the new member states, which threaten hard-won and jealously guarded privileges.
This undertow of discontent, reflecting unemployment rates of 10 per cent or more, helps explain the absence of a natural constituency for the constitutional treaty and the uphill struggle its supporters face in the 10 countries that have signalled that ratification will be by referendum.
But having embarked on that struggle, the constitution’s backers have no option but to battle on. Just as it is difficult to overstate the political turmoil the referendum debate is causing in France, it is hard to exaggerate the risks a No vote would entail.
FT.COM

Politicians often become victims of their own success--or, better yet, mythology. Take British Prime Minister Tony Blair. He once seemed invincible, his two election victories underpinned by large majorities in Britain’s legislature; his New Labour project promising a governing vision that transcended the worn-out ideologies of the 20th century; his youth, vigor and optimism seeming to embody a confident nation on the rise after years of decline and self-doubt.
Eight years later, and less than a month away from a third general election, Blair, now visibly older, his reputation in tatters, distrusted by a majority of voters, is no longer unassailable. Far from it. He is widely seen--even by members of his own Labour party--as out of touch with popular sentiment. History will no doubt view Blair’s decision, in 2003, throw in his lot with George W. Bush and support the US invasion of Iraq, as the moment when he lost the British public, and there’s something to that. But, in truth, aloofness, moral self-certainty, and high-handedness have always been key to Blair’s personality. Only now, the public seems to have had enough.
In the summer of 2001, I traveled with Blair as he campaigned for re-election in the once-industrial city of Birmingham, in the central belt of England. As his cavalcade of buses pulled into a local housing project, a small group of mothers stood demonstrating against recent local government cuts. Blair’s entourage, with all the bombast of a stadium rock show, swept past the group. “He won’t talk to us,“ said one. “Blair doesn’t like talking to people who disagree with him.“
Four years later, after two wars, most controversially Iraq in 2003, less so Afghanistan, Blair’s intransigence in the face of disapproval has become the key note of his second term. Immensely unpopular because of his support of the war in Iraq, pilloried as a poodle for his friendship with Bush, he is seen by the majority of the British electorate as having led the country to war on false pretenses. “The problem is I can apologize for the information being wrong,“ he told Labour party delegates at last September’s party conference in the seaside town of Brighton. “But I can never apologize, sincerely at least, for removing Saddam. The world is a better place with Saddam in prison.“
“Blair’s legacy has been demonstrably altered by his role in the war in Iraq,“ says historian Eric Hobsbawm. “After Iraq, he became synonymous with terms like deceit, spin and presentation. The trust that had once been placed in him vanished after he sided with President Bush against the Europe.“
Thanks to Blair’s unpopularity, Labour will probably see its commanding majority in Parliament--which is to say its ability to get legislation passed--undoubtedly reduced. Blair’s charm, the “Honest John“ facet of his character that worked so well for him in the early years, has worn thin. Even women, once so dependable a Labour constituency that they were dubbed “Blair’s Babes,“ have soured on the prime minister, with a majority recently telling pollsters that they didn’t trust him. A Labour defeat in May is unlikely; still, we can expect the voters to deliver a stinging rebuke to Blair and his party.
Burhan Wazir
MOTHERJONES.COM

There is sometimes a black and ironic humor about the Bush administration’s approach to diplomacy, and two Reuters’ headlines on April 12 were enough to make a cat laugh. They were “Rumsfeld visits Iraq; warns against corruption“ and “US audit probes $212 million in Halliburton Iraq work“.
The ludicrous contrast is in the same league as Bush Washington’s outraged finger-wagging about human rights last month, which was met with barely concealed mirth by the many world leaders who consider that those living in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
Rumsfeld then lectured the Iraqis about governance. He must have forgotten that Iraq is supposed to be a sovereign country (we keep being told this by the Bush propaganda machine) and that it is therefore undiplomatic, to say the least, for him to blather on publicly in such a sententious fashion. But we shouldn’t be surprised. He is, after all, a pompous and incompetent ass, and it has been obvious for a long time that most of us have on occasion blown more appealing life into our handkerchiefs. For him to blithely assume that other nations are inferior and that Washington knows what is best for them is condescending and clownish to the point of imbecility, but is only too common a belief in those who present the Bush image overseas.
The foreign policy of Bush Washington is arrogantly inflexible. It is simply to lecture, hector, bribe and bully those countries which don’t do exactly what the Emperor says. If brazen malevolence doesn’t work, they can then be bombed and invaded, providing they have no means of retaliation.
The Bush emissary to the world, Condoleezza Rice, condescended to visit India, Pakistan and Afghanistan for a day each last month. As with most US diplomacy in the Bush era, the Rice performance was jarring.
First she scolded India for daring to propose building a gas pipeline from Iran, passing through Pakistan. The project is going to be of enormous economic advantage to every country in the region, which is exactly why Bush’s Christian Crusaders are trying to stop it--because anything that might benefit Iran cannot on any account be permitted.
It doesn’t matter to Bush that India has to plan very carefully indeed for its rapidly increasing energy use, and that its prime minister and finance minister are brilliant economists, as is the PM of Pakistan (who is also finance minister). These wise leaders have got their long-term energy plans mapped out. But common-sense and sound economic planning cut no ice with Bush and Rice when placed against their visceral hatred of Iran. As the Times of India put it in a scathing editorial: “this [pipeline plan] is a win-win situation for all, except the party poopers [in Washington]“.
India’s foreign minister, Mr Natwar Singh, observed that “We have no problems of any kind with Iran. We need a lot of new additions to our sources of energy, so the pipeline is important.“ In other words, Delhi politely told Washington to get stuffed, as anyone with the slightest knowledge of India could have predicted. Then Rice went to Pakistan and rebuked it, too. She announced in a media interview (how courteous; how diplomatic) that “any move to strengthen Iran, by trade or otherwise, would be frowned on by the United States.“ According to Rice it is US policy that a country be condemned if it has trade or any other dealings with a neighbor whose economic cooperation is vital, simply because Washington disapproves of it. This is insolent and arrogant imperialism.
Brian Cloughley
BRIANCLOUGHLEY.COM