The Alligator

Benazir Bhutto, like any leader of a nation that has a tradition rife with corruption, military coups, and assassination of leaders had her flaws. But she was undeniably a courageous leader. Her return to Pakistan two months ago raised hopes that her country might find its way toward democracy and stability. Her assassination on Thursday is yet one more horrifying reminder of how far Pakistan is from both — and how close it is to the brink. No blogger with his or her salt could take off the usual holiday hiatus without addressing this appalling act.

Ms. Bhutto’s death leaves the Bush administration with no visible strategy for extricating Pakistan from its crisis or rooting out Al Qaeda and the Taliban, which have made the country their most important rear base.

One thing is clear- Bush and Company believe that the elections should go on as planned in Pahkistan in order to show the world that they are serious about having a free and open election and a democratically elected country. PLEASE! With one party banned from participating due to the sham that Musharaf made of the Pakistani Supreme Court and Bhutto’s own party, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), in turmoil with the assassination of its titular leader.

Senator Chris Dodd was correct today. As much as we want to see free and open elections, they will not happen under the current circumstances. There would be one party in the election- Musharaf – a President who originally came to power in a military coup d’etat. In order to have a fair, open and free election, the Pakistan Peoples Party should be given ample time to regroup and find new leadership that can take up Ms. Bhutto’s mantle.

Benazir Bhutto was a bridge. She was able to successfully bridge the east and the west, she bridged various factions in Pakistan and most importantly she bridged the role of women in a culture that is known to demean women by being an elected female Prime Minister in a Muslim nation.

Bhutto was an amazingly accomplished woman. Benazir Bhutto was born to Begum Nusrat Ispahani, and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of a prominent Shia Muslim family of Larkana , in Karachi in 1953. After completing her early education in Pakistan, she pursued her higher education in the United States. From 1969 to 1973 she attended Radcliffe College at Harvard University, where she obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree with cum laude honors in comparative government. She was also elected to Phi Beta Kappa.
The next phase of her education took place in the United Kingdom. Between 1973 and 1977 Bhutto studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. She completed a course in International Law and Diplomacy while at Oxford. In December 1976 she was elected president of the Oxford Union, becoming the first Asian woman to head the prestigious debating society.

Pakistan was born out of violence and that violence has remained- to one extent or another ever since. In 712, the Arab general Muhammad bin Qasim conquered Sindh and Multan in southern Punjab. The Pakistan government’s official chronology states that “its foundation was laid” as a result of this invasion. This would set the stage for several successive Muslim empires in the Indian subcontinent, including the Ghaznavid Empire, the Ghorid Kingdom, the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal Empire. During this period, Sufi missionaries played a pivotal role in converting a majority of the regional Buddhist and Hindu population to Islam. The gradual decline of the Mughal Empire in the early eighteenth century provided opportunities for the Afghans, Balochis and Sikhs to exercise control over large areas until the British East India Company gained ascendancy over South Asia.

The rebellion, also known as the Indian Mutiny, in 1857 was the region’s last major armed struggle against the British Raj, and it laid the foundations for the generally unarmed freedom struggle led by the mostly Hindu Congress Party. However, the Muslim League rose to popularity in the late 1930s amid fears of under-representation and neglect of Muslims in politics. On 29 December 1930, Allama Iqbal’s presidential address called for an autonomous “state in northwestern India for Indian Muslims, within the body politic of India” Muhammad Ali Jinnah espoused the Two Nation Theory and led the Muslim League to adopt the Lahore Resolution of 1940 (popularly known as the Pakistan Resolution), which ultimately led to the formation of an independent Pakistan.

Pakistan was formed on 14 August 1947 with two Muslim-majority wings in the eastern and northwestern regions of the British Indian Empire, separated from the rest of the country with a Hindu majority, and comprising the provinces of Balochistan, East Bengal, the North-West Frontier Province, West Punjab and Sindh.

The partition of the British Indian Empire resulted in communal riots across India and Pakistan—millions of Muslims moved to Pakistan and millions of Hindus and Sikhs moved to India. Disputes arose over several princely states including Jammu and Kashmir whose ruler had acceded to India following an invasion by Pashtun warriors, leading to the First Kashmir War (194 ending with India occupying roughly two-third of the state. From 1947 to 1956, Pakistan was a Dominion in the Commonwealth of Nations. The republic declared in 1956 was stalled by a coup d’etat by Ayub Khan (1958–69), who was president during a period of internal instability and a second war with India in 1965. His successor, Yahya Khan (1969–71) had to deal with the cyclone which caused 500,000 deaths in East Pakistan.

Economic and political dissent in East Pakistan led to violent political repression and tensions escalating into civil war (Bangladesh War of Independence) and the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 and ultimately the secession of East Pakistan as the independent state of Bangladesh.. Estimates of the number of people killed during this episode vary greatly, from ~30,000 to over 2 million depending on the source.

The Pakistani military has played an influential role in mainstream politics throughout Pakistan’s history, with military presidents ruling from 1958–71, 1977–88 and from 1999 onwards. The leftist Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), led by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, emerged as a major political player during the 1970s and led by his daughter Benazir Bhuttp was the only real threat to Pakistani military rule.

So putting it simply- Pakistan has never been a paragon of stability. But President Bush has put all his eggs in the Musharaf basket for our nation’s hopes for security in a part of the world where we have exerted a huge hand in destroying.

Ms. Bhutto’s death leaves the Bush administration with no visible strategy for extricating Pakistan from its crisis or rooting out Al Qaeda and the Taliban, which have made the country their most important rear base.

Betting America’s security (and Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal) on an unaccountable dictator, President Pervez Musharraf, did not work. Betting it on a back-room alliance between that dictator and Ms. Bhutto, who had hoped to win a third try as prime minister next month, is no longer possible.

That leaves Mr. Bush with the principled, if unfamiliar, option of using American prestige and resources to fortify Pakistan’s badly battered democratic institutions. There is no time to waste.

With next month’s parliamentary elections already scrambled, Washington must now call for new rules to assure a truly democratic vote.

That means a relatively brief delay to allow Ms. Bhutto’s party, probably the country’s largest, to choose a new candidate for prime minister and mount an abbreviated campaign. Washington must also demand that Pakistan’s other main opposition leader, Nawaz Sharif, be allowed to run. And it must insist that Mr. Musharraf reinstate the impartial Supreme Court judges he fired last month in order to block them from overturning his rigged election.

Mr. Musharraf is stubborn. Washington will need to send the same message to Pakistan’s military leaders, perhaps the ex-general’s only remaining backers.

Ms. Bhutto and her father and political mentor, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, were democratic, but imperfect political leaders — imperious, indifferent to human rights and, in her case, tainted by serious charges of corruption. The father was deposed by a military coup and then hanged. The daughter was twice elected and twice deposed. But both had one undeniable asset: electoral legitimacy — legitimacy that the generals and the Islamic extremists could only seek to destroy or, in Mr. Musharraf’s case, hope to borrow.

The Bush administration has to rethink more than just its unhealthy and destructive enabling of Mr. Musharraf. It also must take a hard look at the billions it is funneling to Pakistan’s military. That money is supposed to finance the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. As a report in The Times on Monday showed, Washington hasn’t kept a close watch, and much of it has gone to projects that interested Mr. Musharraf and the Pakistani Army more, like building weapons systems aimed at America’s ally, India. Meanwhile, Al Qaeda and the Taliban continued, and continue, to make alarming gains.

While the Presidential candidates should have the tact not to utilize this tragedy for political fodder (yes Mr. 9/11 Giuliani and Mr. “Let’s Double Guantanomo Romney- I mean you!) the issue should be addressed tactfully as the loss of a leader, the loss of an ally, the loss of a woman, the loss of a wife and the loss of a mother. There are tactful and appropriate ways to address this catastrophic world event while being sensitive to the personal saga that is being played out in Ms. Bhutto’s family.

The United States cannot afford to have Pakistan unravel any further. The lesson of the last six years is that authoritarian leaders — even ones backed with billions in American aid — don’t make reliable allies, and they can’t guarantee security.

The New York Times in its usually eloquent style wrote in an editorial that “American policy must now be directed at building a strong democracy in Pakistan that has the respect and the support of its own citizens and the will and the means to fight Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Pakistan is a nation of 165 million people. The days of Washington mortgaging its interests there to one or two individuals must finally come to an end.”

Senator and President Clinton have been pushing on the experience factor lately. President Clinton, this past weekend, made a very direct hit on Senator Obama’s “lack of experience While at this point, I am supporting Senator Edwards, it has nothing to do with Obama’s experience. I’ve actually begun wondering who I might support should Edwards not make it to the California primary. My choice after Mr. Edwards is Mr. Obama. Edwards doesn’t have a huge resume of experience in the federal government either. Let’s be real about Senator Clinton too. She is a one term Senator who held no other elected office. Mrs. Clinton is a remarkably smart lady but what experience is she touting? In all due respect, her time as First Lady should not factor into this equation- it wasn’t elected and doesn’t give her experience other than by some sort of White House osmosis. So the question remains – is “experience” an issue?

Howard Kurtz from the Washington Post wrote, “Experience? Who needs experience? That just makes you more vulnerable to negative ads.” Senator Obama’s home state of Illinois is particularly good at electing inexperienced nobodies as president—perhaps you’ve heard of Abraham Lincoln?

Let’s think about this for a minute… does anyone really have experience being president, before actually BEING a president?

Now, if we talk about having experience as a governor, or some sort of important governmental position, then I am not sure if that should be a prerequisite to run for presidency.

Senators Obama’s and Edwards’ have more foreign policy experience than that of, Governors turned Presidents—and out of the last five presidents, Bush, Clinton, Reagan, and Carter were all governors.

The last senator to make the jump to the White House had only one term under his belt before winning the Democratic primary. In the general election, he was called unelectable because of one of his inherent characteristics; the country wasn’t ready for such a man to be president, his detractors said. Yet in spite of his Catholicism, John F. Kennedy went on to become one of the most beloved presidents in recent history.

Senators who have “experience” often seem out of touch with real people. The bubble of the Senate makes the world a very different place- especially when it comes to connection and speaking. Senators tend to bloviate- debate is the essence of the Senate. Senators also have a sense of entitlement” that seems to come from being in our version of “The House of Lords”. I once heard that there are 100 people who want to be President that you can locate quickly- the members of the US Senate.

To get an idea of whether experience is something to consider, lets take a look back at some of the past presidents in the US history:

James Buchanan: 29 years
Gerald Ford: 25 years
George H.W. Bush: 17 years
Richard Nixon: 14 years
Bill Clinton: 12 years
Ronald Reagan: 8 years
George W. Bush: 7 years
Abraham Lincoln: 2 years
George Washington: 0 years
Dwight Eisenhower: 0 years

The former president with the most experience, James Buchanan, who had 29 years of service as a representative, senator, ambassador and Secretary of State, is arguably the worst president in the US history. While Abraham Lincoln with only 2 years experience in the federal government is considered a national icon and, with George Washington, one of the most venerated leaders in our nation’s history. Going by this list, it is difficult to say that more experience is better.

Haven’t we learned in the past 7 years that you really don’t need experience to become president? I don’t think Bush is a disastrous president because he has little experience compared to other previous presidents… he’s just awfully stupid, unwilling to accept different viewpoints and ignorant of reality.

It’s more than experience that matters.

It is absurd that in this country based on freedom of religion and freedom not to have a religion, a Presidential candidate would have to “explain” his religious affiliation.

Mitt Romney felt the need to “explain” Mormonism to the country. Romney and many media mavens have hailed his speech on faith as reminiscent of John F. Kennedy’s speech of his Catholicism, faith and the Presidency. Quite frankly there couldn’t be less of a resemblance.

I don’t care if Romney’s faith teaches that Christ came to ancient America, that the Garden of Eden was in Missouri or that the Angel Moroni visited Joseph Smith in New York- giving him magic glasses so he could read the hieroglyphics on the golden plates that had been buried by Moroni in Smith’s New York state back yard and are still in the Angel Moroni’s possession. I don’t care that some believe in virgin births, women being formed from the rib of a man, worshipping desiccated body parts and building cathedrals around them so these relics could provide a prayer path to God. I don’t care if some people believe that the Prophet Mohammad experienced the Isra and Miraj, a miraculous journey said to have been accomplished in one night along with the angel Gabriel. In the first part of the journey, the Isra, he is said to have travelled from Mecca to Jerusalem. In the second part, the Miraj, Muhammad is said to have toured heaven and hell. I don’t care if people believe that God parted the Red Sea and I don’t care if people believe that Jesus had a human mother and deity father. I don’t care if some people believe that one god Brahama created the universe, another- Vishnu preserves it, and a third- Shiva destroys it. I don’t care if Siddhārtha Gautama became enlighted under a fig tree.

However, the very people who Mr. Romney is pandering too- do care. They care very much about a person’s religion and judge him on how on a religious based report card. Remember all the hoopla about a Muslim congressman swearing his oath on the Qu-ran?  Where was the religious freedom in that episode?

When President Kennedy made his speech he specifically stated that religion had no place in this debate. He further said that the Pope, his church or any other religious organizations should have no influence in public poliy.

The Republican party has gone way beyond Mr. Kennedy’s vision and conviction. They brought religious organizations into the mix of public policy and politics when they welcomed Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, James Dobson and Ralph Reed into their inner circle and gave power to conserrvative Christians.

Romney was right when he said that the founding fathers prayed to God and were not of one faith and he correctly pointed out that Jefferson and others were Theists. If in fact the founders envisioned a country where any one was free to worship as he/she chooses do we know how we got to have a nation that sees itself as a “Christian nation”?

We are no longer that nation that Kennedy described where there was a distinct separation between church and state. The Republican party, Mr. Romney’s party, has blurred that line.

Kennedy spoke about how in America preachers do not endorse candidates from the pulpit. Well 47 years later- Conservative Christian preachers commonly endorse candidates from their pulpits- and often times those pulpits are broadcast into people’s homes.

Mr. Romney doesn’t want to be judged on his being a Mormon, but he wants to promote his “conservative” Christian credentials to the Evangelical base. Does this seem a little hypocritical?

But I guess Mr. Romney can rationalize just about anything- he has certainly taken every position possible on every policy issue that matters unapologetically. I certainly admire men and women who are open to changing their opinions on important matters- it can mean an open and curious mind. It just seems convenient that Mr. Romney’s views change dependant upon the constituency he is interested in courting.

But back to religion. It is absurd to say in one breath that one’s religion should not be how one is judged as a candidate, but religion is a vital part of the public square.

If Mr. Romney wants a separation of Church and State- first off he should speak about that and secondly he should leave the Republican Party. The Republican party hasn’t believed in that separation for decades.  But as Mr. Romney courts the Evangelicals- he doesn’t really promote separation from  Church and State- he is promoting that he is just like them!

So which is it Mitt? Should we care that you’re a Mormon or should we remove religion from the Presidential elective process. Sadly it seems Mr. Romney doesn’t want his religion made an issue during the election- but he believes that religion should influence public policy.  

 Don’t forget Mr. Romney’s “faux pas” referring to Obama as Osama- no religious prejudice pandering there!

If Mr. Romney makes it through the right winged Republican nominating process to the general election what incarnation of Mr. Romney will we see and what values will Mr. Romney have as he deals with a more moderate electorate?

Mr. Romney’s religion should not be an issue. Sadly his party has made it an issue in politcs and policy. It’s a different world than the one where there was absolute conviction about the separation of church and state in Kennedy’s 1960.

How I long for those Camelot days!

When I saw a clip of John McCain in April of this year joking about the need to bomb Iran- I couldn’t believe that it was real. Alas it was; the Arizona senator joked about attacking the sovereign nation during a campaign stop in South Carolina in April, singing, to the tune of the Beach Boys song “Barbara Ann”: “That old, that old Beach Boys song, Bomb Iran. Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, anyway.”

I am simply dumb struck by not only that twisted use of sabre rattling as humor, but also by the Bush administration and the Republican Presidential nominees (with the excpetion of Ron Paul) reaction to a new assessment by American intelligence agencies that concludes that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that the program remains frozen, contradicting judgment two years ago that Tehran was working relentlessly toward building a nuclear bomb.

The assessment, a National Intelligence Estimate that represents the consensus view of all 16 American spy agencies, states that Tehran is likely keeping its options open with respect to building a weapon, but that intelligence agencies “do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.” Iran is continuing to produce enriched uranium, a program that the Tehran government has said is designed for civilian purposes. The new estimate says that enrichment program could still provide Iran with enough raw material to produce a nuclear weapon sometime by the middle of next decade, a timetable essentially unchanged from previous estimates.

Rather than painting Iran as a rogue, irrational nation determined to join the club of nations with the bomb, the estimate states Iran’s “decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach rather than a rush to a weapon irrespective of the political, economic and military costs.” The administration called new attention to the threat posed by Iran earlier this year when President Bush had suggested in October that a nuclear-armed Iran could lead to “World War III” and Vice President Dick Cheney promised “serious consequences” if the government in Tehran did not abandon its nuclear program.
Yet at the same time officials were airing these dire warnings about the Iranian threat, analysts at the Central Intelligence Agency were secretly concluding that Iran’s nuclear weapons work halted years ago and that international pressure on the country had been effective.

With the new information about Iran made public, what did President Bush say today at his news conference? “I view this report as a warning signal that they had the program, they halted the program,” Bush said. “The reason why it’s a warning signal is they could restart it.”

Whoa that is some incredible spinning. If the American people or the media buy this spin- well we deserve whatever we get. 

In the his press conference President Bush also said that in August he had been told that there was new intelligence but he hadn’t been told until last week, what that intelligence was. 

Whoa again!  Is the President saying that he didn’t ask the question?  That is complete incompetence.  If he didn’t ask the question he is indeed the stupidest President in our nation’s history.  While I don’t think that the President is that bright, I don’t think he is that retarded.  So the alternative conclusion is that he knew- but kept fear mongering wih images of World War III anyway.  Does that remind anyone of the smoking gun in the form of a mushroom cloud???

After all, Seymour Hersh wrote about this in the New Yorker quite a while ago and the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) has been stating that Iran’s weapons program was not active quite a while ago.  So how could it be possible that the President of the United States didn’t know?  Quite frankly it isn’t. 

What about the Republican presidential candidates? The Republican side, candidates have been jockeying for months to appear toughest on Iran — even tougher than Bush. During a forum sponsored by the Republican Jewish Coalition not long ago, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani said it was “absolutely necessary” to keep military force on the table, former senator Fred Thompson said he would “not allow Iran to become a nuclear threat,” former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney said a military strike was not “some far-flung idea” and in fact “we are poised and ready to act.” And of course there is McCain’s inane “Bomb Iran” song.

After the new National Intelligence Estimate have the Republicans seen that the saber rattling is akin to the blundering that brought us into Iraq? Oh wait- they all think (with the exception of Ron Paul) that going into Iraq was a good idea.

The Republican side was particularly silent on the new NIE. Romney, Thompson and McCain issued no statements on the matter yesterday and spokesmen did not respond to e-mails requesting comment. Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, the newly minted first-tier candidate in Iowa, likewise had nothing to say.

Only Giuliani responded to the development, although his statement made no mention of the salient fact that Iran’s nuclear weapons program evidently closed down four years ago, focusing instead on its continued enrichment program. “For years now, the Islamic Republic of Iran has defied and played games with every international effort aimed at persuading the country to halt enriching uranium,” Giuliani said. “Sanctions and other pressures must be continued and stepped up until Iran complies by halting enrichment activities in a verifiable way.”

I am sure that within the next few days the Republican campaigns will find a spin on this report. Unless they are in the same shape as the Scarecrow in the Wizard of the Oz- in search of a brain- they had better come up with better spin than the President’s inanity today. But what sort of a spin can one put on lying, deceit, war mongering and the heinous act of putting young Americans in harms way for political gain? I hope none; but with this crowd of ineptitude and demagoguery anything is possible.

Hey folks it is 26 years into the epidemic and HIV/AIDS is still a huge problem in the United States. In all due respect to those men, women and children suffering and dying in Africa and elsewhere in the world- it is still a problem in this nation and it is simply not being addressed adequately. Much attention will rightfully be focused on the global epidemic and the horrendous toll it has taken in Africa on today’s World AIDS Day events.  It is my intention here to shine a bright light on our epidemic at home- while acknowledging that our efforts globally are also inadequate. 

 Increasingly HIV/AIDS is a disease of poverty in this nation and can only be adequately combated by addressing poverty. Increasingly people living with HIV/AIDS have a smorgasbord of heath issues that is exacerbated by the “graying” of the epidemic, the fact of decades of ingesting toxic anti retroviral medications, the need to address HIV/ AIDS as one component of overall health for many population and can only be adequately combated by addressing overall health care reform. HIV/AIDS cannot be adequately addressed without treating poverty and the broken nature of our national health care system.

HIV/AIDS has been with the world since 1981. My entire adult life has been informed by this epidemic- from the day I read a New York Times article on July 3, 1981 by Larwence Altman- “Rare Cancer Seen in 41 Homosexuals” when I was 23 years old. Now, I am 50 years old and I have been HIV positive for somewhere around 20 years and full blown AIDS for nearly 9 years.

Some things have changed but sadly many things have not changed. In the early days it was perceived as a “gay” disease and now in the United States impacts all populations with disproportionate impact on African American women, men who have sex with men- specifically young men of color.

Let’s look at a quick snapshot of HIV/AIDS in my city of San Francisco as well as nationally and globally. The statistics at all levels are sobering and are a clarion call that we must remain vigilant.

San Francisco
Today, San Francisco continues to have the nation’s highest per capita prevalence of cumulative AIDS cases, and AIDS remains the second leading cause of premature death in the city. The number of persons living with AIDS in San Francisco has increased by 43% over the last decade alone - a percentage that does include more rapidly escalating non-AIDS HIV cases Through December 31, 2006, a cumulative total of 26,991 cases of AIDS had been diagnosed in San Francisco, accounting for nearly 3% of all AIDS cases ever identified in the US (n=925,452) and nearly 20% of all AIDS cases diagnosed in California (n=139,019), despite the fact that San Francisco County contains only 2% of the state’s population.

In San Francisco- one out of every four gay men is HIV infected. One in every 37 residents of the city of San Francisco is living with HIV/AIDS (2,713 cases of HIV per 100,000). As of December 31, 2006, the incidence of persons living with AIDS per 100,000 in San Francisco County (1,292.1 per 100,000) was over five times that of Los Angeles County (217.1 per 100,000) and nearly double that of New York City (757.0 per 100,000).

USA
Here are the statistics for the USA according to the Kaiser Family Foundation:
Number of new HIV infections each year: 40,000
Number of people living with HIV/AIDS: 1.2 million, including more than 400,000 with AIDS
Number of deaths among people with AIDS in 2005: 17,011
Percent of people with HIV/AIDS not in care: 42%–59%
Percent of people infected with HIV who don’t know it: 25%

Globally
UNAIDS and the WHO indicate that between 2001 and 2007:
The number of people living with HIV/AIDS globally rose from 29 million in 2001 to 33.2 million in 2007, due to continuing new infections, people living longer with HIV, and general population growth;
The global prevalence rate (the percent of the population with HIV) leveled over this period at 0.8%;
Annual deaths increased from 1.7 million in 2001 to 2.1 million in 2007, but have declined in the last couple of years due in part to antiretroviral treatment scale up;
New HIV infections are believed to have peaked in the late 1990s, and declined between 2001 and 2007 from 3.2 million to 2.5 million. The decline is attributable to natural trends in the epidemic itself and to prevention efforts. Still, in 2007, there were more than 6,800 new HIV infections each day;2
Women represent half of all people living with HIV/AIDS, as they have since the mid-1990s;
HIV is among the leading causes of death worldwide and the number one cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa;
Most people with HIV are unaware that they are infected.

The world’s focus has shifted from the epidemic in the industrial world to the epidemic in the third world- specifically sub-Saharan Africa. It is appropriate to pour resources into the epidemic in Africa. But it is vital to address the epidemic at home as well.

President Bush has pledged billions of dollars to combat AIDS in Africa- that is commendable. But he has at best flat funded programs for HIV/AIDS and other health care issues and often he has slashed them. Most recently Congress added more funding for HIV/AIDS to the Labor/ Health/ Education bill but Mr. Bush vetoed it. Mr. Bush has also vetoed other health issues- most notably a needed expansion in the SCHIP program.

My message to Mr. Bush and his Republican friends in Congress and the Presidential candidates is that HIV/AIDS is still a very real problem in this nation.

I am supporting John Edwards for President for a variety of reasons- but a critical reason for my support is his platform on addressing HIV/AIDS at home and his emphasis on poverty as a critical issue for this country. Poverty is co-morbid with HIV/AIDS.

John Edwards was the first presidential candidate – Democratic or Republican – to take on the big insurance and drug companies and propose a plan for quality, affordable health care for every man, woman and child in America that offers everyone the option of a public plan. Today, John Edwards builds on his plan for true universal health care with specific proposals to lead the fight against HIV/AIDS at home and around the world. He will include a comprehensive new national strategy to fight HIV/AIDS, including:

Calling for universal access to HIV/AIDS medicine across the world, investing $50 billion over five years to meet that goal;

Changing the policies that protect big drug companies, at the expense of people dying of HIV/AIDS in developing countries.

Guaranteeing Treatment for Everyone with True Universal Health Care by 2012. People with HIV/AIDS who don’t have health insurance or who have inadequate insurance are significantly more likely to die from the disease. That’s the tragedy of the two health care systems in this country today – one for people who can afford the very best care and one for everyone else. True universal health care must be the foundation for a national HIV/AIDS strategy. Edwards’ plan will ensure every person in America living with HIV/AIDS gets the care they need, when they need it. His plan will also transform chronic care with a new patient-centered “medical home” approach where a primary care physician will make sure patients are getting effective treatment from a coordinated team, including palliative care. [Bhattacharya, 2003] Edwards supports the Early Treatment for HIV Act which will expand Medicaid to cover HIV-positive individuals in every state before they reach later stages of disability and AIDS. Currently, in most states, individuals must receive an AIDS diagnosis to receive services under Medicaid even though research shows that the sooner individuals living with HIV receive treatment the better the outcomes. [Porco et al., 2004]

In 2001, the CDC set a national goal of reducing the annual number of new infections in half by 2005, but the actual number of infections has barely budged. A 1998 presidential initiative set a goal of eliminating racial disparities in HIV/AIDS by 2010, but disparities are as bad today as they were then. Our disappointments can be explained in part by the failure to create a national strategy, backed by necessary funding and with clear and bold goals, specific action steps, real accountability and broad participation and buy-in from stakeholders both inside and outside of government. As president, Edwards will develop a National HIV/AIDS Strategy through an honest, comprehensive and fast-tracked process that involves stakeholders from the public and nonprofit sectors. The National Strategy will coordinate the various agencies within and outside of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that affect HIV/AIDS policy. He will hold his HHS Secretary accountable for issuing an annual report on HIV/AIDS that charts progress towards our national goals, and he will appoint a strong director of the White House office of AIDS Policy to keep these issues visible at the highest levels of government. [CDC, 1999, 2001, 2007; HHS, 1998]

About two-thirds of all new HIV/AIDS cases are diagnosed in African Americans and Latinos. African Americans are infected at nearly 10 times the rate, and Latinos at more than three times the rate, of white Americans. A 2005 study of African-American men who have sex with men in selected cities found that almost half are infected with HIV, and 67 percent do not know they have the disease. Latina women are six times more likely than white women to have HIV/AIDS. Any serious effort to end the HIV/AIDS epidemic must begin in the African-American and Latino communities, including among the incarcerated population, and address their prevention and treatment needs. We must also continue to work intensively with important overlapping groups like gay men. [CDC, 2007; KFF, 2007]

Enacting true universal health care will ensure patients have access to care, but fully funding the Ryan White CARE Act will remain essential to ensure that culturally-competent care is available for the special needs of people living with HIV/AIDS. These programs include outpatient HIV early intervention services, support services like transportation, case management, substance abuse and mental health treatment, nutrition, family-centered care for children, access to clinical trials and delivery to hard-to-reach populations. Maintaining delivery of outreach and treatment services to the LGBT community, for example, is dependent on these programs. Edwards will also put an end to waiting lines for HIV drugs — for example, more than 300 people with HIV/AIDS are on a waiting list for medication in South Carolina – and increase funds for the Housing for People with AIDS (HOPWA) programs, only federal program that provides comprehensive, community-based housing for people with HIV/AIDS. [NASTAD, 2007]

Preventing HIV/AIDS with Scientifically-Proven Strategies, Not Political Ideology
The CDC has identified the three most reliable ways to prevent HIV/AIDS infections. Yet the Bush administration focuses on only one of them – abstinence. As president, Edwards will promotes all reliable prevention strategies, including comprehensive, age-appropriate sex education to ensure young people learn all the facts about preventing HIV/AIDS and harm-reduction programs that provide high-risk individuals with access to clean syringes. He will lift the ban on federal funding for needle exchange initiatives. In addition, Edwards will support community and public education that encourages testing. [CDC, Undated; Bush, 2005]

Mr. Edwards addresses another issue in his campaign that must be addressed- poverty. Trying to fight HIV/AIDS without addressing poverty is counterintuitive.

Without addressing HIV/AIDS as part of overall health reform- a critical issue for all Americans- not just those infected and at risk for HIV/AIDS, without addressing HIV/AIDS without addressing poverty, without addressing HIV/AIDS without addressing the larger issue of health disparities, and without addressing HIV/AIDS at home as well as globally- we will, I am afraid, be emptying the ocean with a teaspoon.