Envy

There is an AP story about a plan concerning Iran proposed by Vladimir Putin and favored by George Bush. A slight obstacle exists, however, to American and Russian cooperation in the form of some laws that Putin wants to see implemented in his country.

These possible statutes are of such human rights concern that, “Two former vice presidential candidates, Republican Jack Kemp and Democrat John Edwards, had urged Bush to bring up the issue with Putin. ‘If this proposal comes into force, the government will clearly have in its hands the authority to close down public organizations simply because it finds their views and activities inconvenient,‘ Kemp and Edwards wrote Bush. They are co-chairmen of a Council on Foreign Relations task force on Russia.”

Bush heeded the senators’ words as, “National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley said Bush raised the matter with Putin but would not describe what he said. ‘Sometimes there are issues that can be more productively discussed out of public view,’ he said.” Perhaps Mr. Hadley feels this way because Bush might have told Putin he thought the laws were a good idea and he wished he could get away with having them in America.