No Problem

So the Red Cross believe that Saddam Hussein may be improperly held in custody by the U.S.:

Saddam Hussein must either be released from custody by June 30 or charged if the US and the new Iraqi government are to conform to international law, the International Committee of the Red Cross said last night.
Nada Doumani, a spokeswoman for the ICRC, told the Guardian: "The United States defines Saddam Hussein as a prisoner of war. At the end of an occupation PoWs have to be released provided they have no penal charges against them."

Apparently, this is a publicity stunt to highlight the detainment of other Iraqis, but this idea of turning Saddam free doesn't seem so bad. In fact, I'd rather like to see what would happen if he were unceremoniously dumped out of an SUV into downtown Baghdad. Of course, it wouldn't do very much for the triumph of the Rule of Law, but mob justice has a certain appeal.

From the Front Line of the Cola Wars

I have a bad habit: I love to try drinks. Be it a high-quality bourbon or a black-light sensitive mixed drink, the latest unlikely combo of fruit juices or the latest attempt to ruin a good soda, I'm always curious. With that vice in mind, today I purchased a Coke C2.

Coke is apparently the newest comapny to succumb to the Atkins fad (see Karl's column for details), as the new Coke (but not New Coke) has "half the carbohydrates, calories, and sugar of regular cola, and 'all the great taste' of Coca-Cola." Well, no. I'll grant that C2 does have half the carbs and calories of regular Coke - slightly less than half, actually. And I'll even grant that C2 has half the sugars of Coke, but to say it has half the sugar is a bit misleading, since there hasn't been real cane sugar in Coke for almost 20 years. Well, in the US, anyway - you can still get Coke made with real sugar in most of the rest of the world, and it is significantly better.

Anyway - the real issue here is the "great taste." It's not there. Coke C2 tastes exactly like what it most likely is: equal parts Diet Coke and Coke Classic poured into the same bottle. It's genuinely vile. If I wanted a Diet Coke, I'd drink one - and if I wanted a real Coke, I'd drink one. This pitiful attempt at a soda should be an embarassment to the execs of Coca-Cola. Final verdict? I give this drink a 'C.' It's not as offensive as the Sprite Remixes (ugh!), but that's only because the drink is such a half-hearted attempt at anything that it couldn't even screw up properly.

Also: The execs at Coke will probably be getting notice of a lawsuit in the mail soon - check out the logo for T2: Judgement Day and compare it to C2: Bland Soda. Geesh.

Democracy in Action

Over two months ago, on April 6th, North Korean defectors came to IU to give testimony of their experience in their former country's concentration camps. The nonpartisan event, sponsored by the Mortar Board Society and co-sponsored by the College Democrats, College Republicans, East Asian Studies Center, and Korean Students Association, opened many eyes to a crisis with parallels to the Holocaust and the Soviet gulag.

On April 28th, human rights activists held a North Korean Freedom Day rally in the nation's capital. Not a word in the Washington Post or Times (aside from a passing mention in an editorial) - bipartisan press apathy.

But that apathy is not universal. A few weeks ago, Rachel Friedman, in National Review Online, detailed the efforts of students around the country to raise awareness of the situation in North Korea.

And now IU students are getting more actively involved.

To your left, among the links to various articles, is a link to a petition. That petition, from Indiana University students to Sen. Lugar (R-IN), asks Mr. Lugar to focus on North Korean rights, specifically on the North Korean Freedom Act of 2003.

If we can send the senator a petition with hundreds of signatures, we just might be able to end the current Senate inertia. As Indiana's senior senator, Mr. Lugar would necessarily be responsive to hundreds of IU students. And, as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he has the power to change the current dynamic.

The Act, co-sponsored by Sens. Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Evan Bayh (D-IN), has largely escaped the attention of both the media and, it seems, of much of the Senate. (In fact, its language has yet to be finalized.)

A controversial bill? Not particularly. It requires human rights to be on the table (often not the case) in any negotiations with North Korea. It establishes various methods for monitoring human rights abuses. And it asks China to reverse course and follow UN law on refugees. (The complete act can be found with a simple search on thomas.loc.gov.)

This is a petition on which most of us should be able to agree. The Act is bipartisan and straightforward; it avoids the incessant neocon/realist/internationalist/isolationist battles. Far from a declaration of war (or even a more aggressive nuclear containment approach), the bill singles out and tries to address the atrocious human rights situation in the DPRK.

This is a human issue, not a partisan issue. The joke is that this is the one thing on which Sam Brownback and Ted Kennedy can agree.

As of this writing, 21 people and one organization have signed the petition. We need more - a lot more. Inform your friends and your enemies.

Let's be a part of the democratic process and effect change through our representatives: constituent service at work.

We have an opportunity here - let's make the most of it.