Mandela taken off US terror list

I just read here that Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, former president of South Africa, Freedom Fighter, anti-Apartheid Activist, Nobel Prize winner, Humanitarian, etc, etc was just taken of the US’s terror list.

The African National Congress (ANC) was designated as a terrorist organisation by South Africa's old apartheid regime. ...
Under the legislation, members of the ANC could travel to the United Nations headquarters in New York but not to Washington DC or other parts of the United States.

I am amazed. Not so much that the members of the ANC got put on this list. It is somewhat understandable, given the way the West thought of such “insurgents” at the time that they got put on the list. I am however surprised that it took the US this long to get their act together, after all the craziness of apartheid had been resolved (at least the main big political issues) to get these guys off the list. So I can’t vouch for any of the other members of the ANC (some of them have been prosecuted for various offences since the end of apartheid), but really, Nelson Mandela too, really? Only eighteen years after his release from prison, only 14 years after he became president and only 9 years after he was president. Maybe the powers that be thought, what can we get him for his ninetieth birthday present? We know, we will take him of the terrorist list. WOW.

I have very few heroes. But of the few I do, Nelson Mandela is one of my most respected. I want to be just like him when I grow up. :-)

And now I will end with a quote from another well known African leader (although for entirely different reasons than Mandela).

Our economy is a hundred times better, than the average African economy. Outside South Africa, what country is [as good as] Zimbabwe? What is lacking now are goods on the shelves - that is all. (Robert Mugabe)

Please don't get me started on this guy. Maybe some day.
After yesterday's posting, I figured I should lay off the US for a bit and focus on my own continent.

Why I am voting Republican

Disclaimer: This video has a huge bias (jeez, it is so obvious it smacks you in the face). I don’t believe Republicans (most or even any) will agree with everything these people are saying. But it is funny and I had to share.

p.s. You have to watch to the very end of the video.

The Democratic Primaries are over

And I am glad. Ideologically, I found Obama and Clinton to be pretty much the same candidate. [My instinct here is to refer to her as Hillary, but I get annoyed when people refer to Barak more formally but are informal with Clinton. I am not sure if it is because she is a woman or because we already have a Clinton and so we don’t want to get the names confused.] On the issues I am in agreement, they hold the same views. On the issues I didn’t agree with them, again, I didn’t agree with either of them.

As a Black Woman however, I was torn. Did I want a Black man (possibly the first Black US president) or a Woman (again, possibly the first female US president).

As an African Woman who is alum of a women’s college, I was even further torn. Of course, I wanted to support the African man who could by some simple (really, most Africans are related by only four degrees) extensions be my uncle/cousin. Even though we are from different countries and more importantly different ethnic groups, you know Africans are all really family. You know, the reason why every time I tell anyone where I am from, they feel the need to tell me about that friend from Madagascar or some other African country. [And no, that’s not where I come from, not even close. Of course I know them. Their grandmother and mine often picked firewood from the same spot.] So I was really rooting for Obama.

But then again, there is nothing stronger than the bond between daughters of the Seven Sisters. Being that I attended the oldest sister and Clinton went to Wellesley (maybe some day I will blog about how Wellesley is the one school I really wanted to get into for college and didn’t.) This seven sisters bond transcends age, backgrounds, location or political ideology. I can’t count how many times I have met another product of the seven sisters (not necessarily from the one I went to) and how we immediately have so much in common. Sometimes more in common than with other women/people I have known for several years. It is a really special thing that cannot be explained.

And so with all this turmoil, I am really glad I didn’t get a chance to choose between the two. You can’t imagine how hard that would have been.