TURKS & CAICOS SUN
Page 37
APRIL 8TH - APRIL 15TH 2013
WORLD NEWS
President Barack Obama apologises to California Attorney General Kamla Harris for his sexist remarks U
S President Barack Obama has apologised to Kamla Harris, the California Attorney General, for his comment in which he described the Indian-American as the best-looking attorney general of America – which many here alleged was a sexist remark. Obama called Harris last night to “apologise” for both his “remarks” and the “distraction” that it caused for one of the brilliant attorney generals of the country, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters. “The president did speak with Attorney General Harris last night after he came back from his trip, and he called her to apologise for the distraction created by his comments. And you know, they are old friends and good friends, and he did not want in any way to diminish the Attorney General’s professional accomplishments and her capabilities,” Carney said. He was responding to questions on the comments
Obama called Kamla Harris the best-looking attorney general in the country made by Obama on Harris at a Democratic fundraiser in California wherein he praised 48-year-old Harris. “She is brilliant and she is dedicated and she is tough, and she is exactly what you’d want in anybody who is administering the law, and making sure that everybody is getting a fair shake,” Obama said praising Harris, who is the first women and first Indian-American to be elected as the Attorney General of
California. “She also happens to be by far the best-looking attorney general in the country – Kamala Harris is here,” Obama had said amidst applause. “It’s true. Come on,” he said amidst laughter. “She is a great friend and has just been a great supporter for many, many years,” said the US President, which soon became a buzzword on the social media and a point for criticising Obama.
“I think I made clear he apologized for creating this distraction and believes very strongly that Attorney General Harris is an excellent attorney general and that she’s done great work, and she’s dedicated and tough and brilliant,” Carney said. “I would note that he called her, in those same comments, brilliant, dedicated and tough, and she is all those things. She has been a remarkably effective leader as Attorney General. She is a key player in the mortgage settlement, which will help many, many middle-class families who are struggling to deal with the mortgage situation in this country. He believes and fully recognises that the challenges women – or he fully recognises the challenge women continue to face in the workplace and that they should not be judged based on appearance,” Carney said. Daughter of an Indian mother Shyamala Gopalan
– a breast cancer specialist who emigrated from Chennai, to the United States in 1960 - and a Jamaican American father, Harris is the first female, African-American, and Asian American attorney general in California, as well as the first ethnic Indian American attorney general in the United States. According to Politico, certainly, Obama meant no insult, but in singling out Harris for her looks, Obama joins a long list of public figures who just can’t seem to let an attractive woman’s looks go without comment. Last year, Republican Attorney General candidate David Freed said Democratic opponent Kathleen Kane’s strengths were that she’s “pretty and has a lot of money,” according to Pennsylvania’s Daily Review. Obama came under some fire back in 2008 when he referred to a female reporter as “sweetie” and told her to hold a question for a press availability, the ABC news reported.
Chavez protege invokes Venezuelan curse on opposition voters V
enezuelan acting President Nicolas Maduro said on Saturday a centuries-old curse would fall on the heads of those who do not vote for him in next week’s election to pick a successor to late leader Hugo Chavez. Maduro’s invocation of the “curse of Macarapana” was the latest twist in an increasingly surreal fight between him and opposition leader Henrique Capriles for control of the South American OPEC nation of 29 million people. “If anyone among the people votes against Nicolas Maduro, he is voting against himself, and the curse of Macarapana is falling on him,” said Maduro, referring to the 16th-century Battle of Macarapana when Spanish colonial fighters massacred local Indian forces. Wearing a local indigenous hat at a rally in Amazonas state, a largely jungle territory on the borders of Brazil and Colombia, Maduro compared Capriles and the opposition coalition to the enslaving Spanish occupiers. “If the bourgeoisie win, they are going to privatize health and education, they are going to take land from the Indians, the curse of Macarapana would come on you,” he added. CAPRILES: REAL CURSE IS GOVERNMENT Calling himself the “son” of Chavez, Maduro has more than a 10-point lead in most polls, although Capriles supporters are predicting a late pro-opposition surge as sympathy wears off from the former president’s death a month ago.
Capriles, 40, a state governor, says Venezuela needs a fresh start after 14 years of Chavez’s hardline socialism, and is vowing to install a Brazilian-style administration of free-market economics with strong social policies. He ridiculed Maduro’s latest speech. “Anyone who threatens the people, who tells the people a curse can fall on them, has no right to govern this country,” he said at a rally in western Tachira state. “I tell you here, all Venezuelans, the real curse is that little group that we are going to get rid of on April 14.” The opposition leader also continued to mock Maduro’s twice-told story of having seen the spirit of Chavez in a bird that flew over his head and sang to him last week. While to some outsiders, talk of spirits and curses may seem absurd in an election campaign, Venezuela’s mix of Catholic and animist beliefs, especially in the south-central plains and jungles, is fertile ground for such references. Maduro also revived accusations of a plot to kill him, saying foreign mercenaries had entered from Central America with plans to spread violence and sabotage the electricity grid. “The third aim is to kill me. They want to kill me because they know I can’t be beaten in free elections,” he said at a later rally, again alleging the complicity of current and former U.S. officials along with right-
wing politicians in El Salvador. “They sent paid hitmen to kill me. ... But I won’t let myself be killed. I will remain on the streets with the people.” The U.S. government, and two former Bush administration officials named by Maduro, have denied and ridiculed the claims that echoed Chavez’s frequent denunciations of assassination plots against him during his 14-year rule. Maduro, 50, was a bus driver and union leader who rose to become Chavez’s foreign minister and then vice president. In his daily campaign rallies, Maduro has been referring constantly to Chavez and playing a video where the former president endorses his protégé last year as his successor. Puncturing Capriles’ public admiration of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Maduro has also been playing a video of the former Brazilian president endorsing him too. At his rallies, Capriles mocks Maduro as a cheap imitation of Chavez. He says Maduro’s track record during the president’s sickness from cancer and after his death has wrought disaster on Venezuelans in terms of a currency devaluation and price rises. Venezuela’s vote will decide not only the future of “Chavismo” socialism but also control of the world’s biggest oil reserves and economic aid to left-leaning nations in Latin America and the Caribbean from Cuba to Ecuador.