I stayed up to watch President Obama on Jay Leno last night. As a communications guy trained as a journalist, it raised a lot of issues.

he mainstream press have always been the gatekeepers between the President and the public. Beyond an “Address to the Nation,” if you want to talk to the American people, you go through the press. You do a press conference. You appear on Meet the Press. You grant an exclusive interview to Charles Gibson, Brian Williams, or Katie Couric (or one of their minions).

But the press is combative, full of “gotcha” intentions, hoping to catch you in an inconsistency. What if you just want to talk to the American people in a non-combative situation? What if you don’t have time to prep for every possible clever question so that you don’t get twisted up and end up re-explaining yourself for the next week?

Imagine if Obama appeared on a FoxNews program. They would try to put him on the spot, force him to defend whatever he’s doing, trap him. They would try to get him to at least imply something negative about various Democrats–Pelosi, Dodd, Frank, Reid, and others. Obama would most definitely be on his guard, and rightfully so.

On the other hand, if Obama appeared on Keith Olberman or Rachel Maddow, they would throw softball questions which he could hit out of the park. They would set him up to say negative things about Republicans. 

Or, if Obama appeared with a real journalist, like the network anchors (well, maybe not Katie), David Gregory, Chris Wallace, or any number of others (including print people), they would have been going for a story. The goal wouldn’t have been enlightenment, but a “gotcha.”

The Rick Warren forum last summer was an eye-opener. Warren posed questions to Obama and McCain, separately, and they answered in a comfortable atmosphere. Warren wasn’t going for a headline, wasn’t trying to trap the candidates, didn’t want the candidates to get into an argument. He just wanted them to tell what they believed. And I found it tremendously enlightening.

It was the same way with Jay Leno. Jay’s not a journalist. He wasn’t trying to create breaking news. He just threw soft, but interesting, questions at Obama (I’m sure Robert Gibbs was involved in at least suggesting questions), and Obama answered them in what was a comfortable, non-tense atmosphere. None of Jay’s questions invited Obama to criticize Republicans. 

I found the appearance very informative, very “human.” It was presidential and laid-back and even fun at the same time.

This, by the way, is Larry King’s schtick, too. He just lets people tell their story, give their views. He’s not a journalist, doesn’t pretend to be, and so isn’t going for a gotcha. 

The mainstream media are mad, because they’re getting cut out of the process. But I don’t care. I’m tired of the gotcha mania.

I’m disappointed that President Obama didn’t veto the stimulus bill and send it back to Congress to eliminate all the pork. I feel like he gave in. I’m in sympathy with John McCain, who argues for vetoing this bill. “If he wants to argue this is last year’s business, we should send it to Crawford [Texas] to get signed.” And yet:

• While it sounds like a lame excuse, and while the bill IS being signed on his watch, there is some truth to the argument that it is last year’s business. Still, the lameness is very strong.
• Obama has expressed his displeasure with the pork, both privately and publicly. So, trying to put a positive construction on things, I’m gonna assume that he received assurances from Congressional leaders that, next time, things will be different.
• It’s not easy fighting a Congress with entrenched ways of doing things. Can you imagine going to battle against over 8000 individual earmarks? Is that not only a battle worth fighting, but a battle that could be won? (Maybe yes.)
• Congress is, indeed, a separate branch of government, not subservient to the Administrative branch. On the other hand, it is the president who signs bills into law, so it’s a team effort. He doesn’t have to sign something he doesn’t like.
• Nancy Pelosi has plenty of her own pork in the bill. There is an element of needing to appease in order to gain her approval for future things the President wants to do. It’s distasteful, but that’s how politics is played. 
• Obama’s taking the right approach in trying to overhaul the whole earmark process. Rather than fight the same battle with each bill, just change the underlying rules of the game. Very smart way to go.

There’s talk now of doing a second stimulus package. Why? I have no clue. Let the circus begin. But it they begin working on a new animal, it’ll be interesting to see what happens with pork. If there’s a second stimulus, Obama MUST win this time. I’m not confident he will, no matter how hard he tries. Congress is a tough, selfish, greedy opponent.

Some churches in Toronto banded together to sponsor Anwar Hassan, an ethnic Ulghur imprisoned at Guantanamo. The US has ruled that he’s not an enemy combatant, but he fears he’ll be persecuted if he returns to his original homeland of China.

The churches applied to sponsor Hassan as a refugee and support him for one year, to at least get him out of Gitmo. The process is underway.

Hassan was among 17 Uighurs captured in Pakistan in 2001 and then sold to US forces (the Gitmo detaines represent millions of dollars of investment; Pakistanis sold many men, both guilty and innocent, to US forces). Other Ulghurs were rounded up elsewhere. Hassan had been living in Afghanistan with thoughts (delusions, actually) of someday rising up against the Chinese government. He fled to Pakistan when the US bombed his village.

The US recognized early on that the Ulghurs had nothing to do with Al Qaeda. Initially, they were milked for information about China. Then, to gain Chinese support for the invasion of Iraq,the Pentagon declared that all of the Ulghurs were members of the East Turkestan Independence Movement (based on the Ulghurs’ name for their homeland), and were therefore terrorists. Chinese interrogators were even allowed to come to Guantanamo. 

And so, the innocent Ulghurs have languished in Gitmo for eight years. Several of them were declared “not enemy combatants,” but the Pentagon changed that to “No longer enemy combatants,” a way to cover themselves. 

The State Department has searched for a country to take in the Ulghurs, but can’t find any willing to suffer the displeasure of China. Several Ulghurs, three days before a US appeals court was scheduled to hear their case for wrongful imprisonment, were taken from Gitmo and deposited in a UN refugee camp in Albania. Yes, Albania. They had already been forcibly separated from their families. Now, how in the world do you get out of Albania?

The Ulghur commuity in the United States has offered to support the detainees with housing, language and job training, and whatever else they need. In October, a US federal court ordered that the Ulghurs be resettled in the US, but an appeals court (stocked with Bush appointees) overturned that decision, saying only the President had the authority to order their release.

The Bush Administration fought efforts to resettle the Ulghurs in the US, claiming they posed a threat to the US.

“I think it’s all about saving face,” says Sabin Willet, a US lawyer who has been working on behalf of the Ulghurs. “If these guys get to the United States, people are going to interview them and put them on television, and then Americans will find out who’s really been at Guantanamo, and that will shock them. Right now most Americans believe that people at Guantanamo must be bad guys. So I think the Bush administration is determined to keep that truth from the public.”

Certainly there ARE bad guys at Gitmo. But not all of them.

The Bible demands that Christians seek justice. I’m hoping my country can come through on this. When justice is brought to the innocent, God is pleased.

(There is a lot of information on the internet about the plight of the Ulghurs, including here and here.)