The following is a selection of letters sent to the World Socialist Web Site in response to the article “ISO ignores every question of principle in Strauss-Kahn affair.”
Thanks so much for this article.
I read the article by Lichi D’Amelio and Natalia Tylim and was shocked at the complete disregard the rule of law—the setting of equal standards of justice for all, regardless what one may think of an individual or the crime they’re accused of.
By dint of their own reference, the William Saletan article they cite on Slate.com says:
“… according to the DA, [Diallo] shows a dismaying ‘ability to recount…fiction as fact with complete conviction.’
“That’s pretty damning. But in the fine-print footnote below this denunciation, the DA says that in her June 9 and June 28 interviews, Diallo ‘stated that she had indeed been raped in the past in her native country, but in a completely different incident than the one that she had described in her earlier interviews. Our interviews of the complainant yielded no independent means of investigating or verifying this incident.’
“In other words, she did not say that the rape was ‘entirely fabricated.’ She changed the details. That doesn’t excuse her dishonesty. But it does narrow the extent to which she has shown a willingness to lie—not to mention the obvious difference between sending an innocent man to jail and distorting a bygone rape by unnamed assailants to get asylum.”
That qualifies her to accuse a man of rape? What an absurd thing to assert: that, because she just “changed the details” (which were unverifiable) and the lie she told may have had elements of truth to it, she is a credible witness and accuser. Would any sane person call such testimony reliable?
Would Saletan, D’Amelio or Tylim want to face charges that could land them in jail for 25 years and disgrace them for life with this dubious witness entering testimony against them? Would anybody? This person told these lies under oath.
To underscore the politics of the ISO, their grassroots movement in the “struggle against sexism and for gender equality” is called SlutWalk. What member over the age of 25 could recount the name of such a program without a hint of embarrassment to their friends? This program has also been mentioned on their web site as a part of the “class struggle” in the current economic crisis.
Is the ISO just for angry sophomore college art students or can anyone join?
Frank
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Bravo! Great piece. I wrote a lengthy comment to them and made many of the same points. They wanted him out at the IMF and didn’t have the votes. Or they did but thought his ouster might play against their man Sarkozy in the upcoming election and didn’t want to give DSK the fodder.
This case was a study in prejudice. Those who were prone to look upon a rich, white Jewish male more favorably than a female African immigrant saw it one way; those with the opposite prejudice saw it the other. What a shame so few had the intelligence to just look at the facts. If one did, this affair was pretty transparent from very near the beginning.
Dave
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You write, “Socialist Worker brings up the allegations of Tristane Banon, the 32-year-old French writer who now claims that Strauss-Kahn tried to rape her in 2003, without mentioning what Newsweek magazine managed to point out, that Banon’s mother, Anne Mansouret, who urged her daughter to pursue the issue, ‘is an ambitious politician in her own right who is often identified with Strauss-Kahn’s rivals in the French Socialist Party.’“
While trying to make your point, you should be honest enough to point out that Tristan Banon first talked publicly about this in 2007, and at that time her mother was very much in the DSK camp, and that DSK’s daughter admits that Tristan Banon spoke to her about the attack shortly after it took place.
By changing the dates and putting in the bit about her mother you let your article suggest that this was all a post Sofitel plot against Strauss-Kahn.
Edward
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Congratulations on being the only organisation—of any kind—to present a full, principled, correct and honest assessment of this attempt, conducted on a worldwide scale, to undermine our already diminished justice system. Shame on anyone, especially on so-called socialists, who have participated in this political outrage.
John K
West Sussex, Britain
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Yes, an excellent article. Really very, very good. A lucid deconstruction of one rotten branch of the fake and fraudulent left.
Chris
Ireland