{"id":5549,"date":"2008-12-07T14:35:40","date_gmt":"2008-12-07T19:35:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com?p=5549"},"modified":"2008-12-10T14:15:09","modified_gmt":"2008-12-10T19:15:09","slug":"sonal_shah_unde","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/2008\/12\/07\/sonal_shah_unde\/","title":{"rendered":"Sonal Shah under pressure"},"content":{"rendered":"

At the same time that one report mentions Sonal as a possible cabinet choice<\/a>, Sonal seems to be under pressure as a member of the transition team<\/a> as a couple of mainstream media outlets started to write about her.<\/p>\n\n

I last posted about Sonal when she issued her statement<\/a>, almost a month ago. In case, you’ve forgotten, here are the key things she said:<\/a><\/p>\n\n

    \n
  1. \n
    “my personal politics have nothing in common with the views espoused by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), or any such organization”<\/div>\n
  2. \n
    “I’ve always condemned any politics of division, of ethnic or religious hatred, of violence and intimidation as a political tool”<\/div>\n
  3. \n
    “factually inaccurate internet rumors have attempted to link me to Hindu Nationalist groups through a variety of tenuous connections: Relief work I’m proud to have helped coordinate following the Gujarati earthquake of 2001 … “<\/div>\n
  4. \n
    “I do not subscribe to the views of such Hindu nationalist groups, and never have”<\/div><\/li><\/ol>\n\n

    Since then, however, there have been four new developments (listed chronologically) in the continuing saga of Sonal Shah:<\/p>\n\n

    <<\/p>\n\n

    p>1 <\/span>The general secretary of VHP-America said<\/a> <\/u>Sonal was a member of the governing council of the VHPA<\/strong> <\/span><\/font><\/strong>for three years. Her critics followed up with a link to the “VHP Governing Council & Chapter Presidents\/Coordinators List<\/em>” in 1998, hosted on Hindunet.org, which showed Sonal as a member of that group, and listed her US Treasury department email as a contact<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

    <\/p>\n\n

    Sonal’s earlier statement stated that she was not a member of any Sangh organization in India and had implied that she had never been a member of the VHP-A, but had simply coordinated relief efforts after the earthquake. There was no response by her supporters, some of whom had argued outright that she was not a member of the VHPA, to this news. <\/p>\n\n

    2 <\/span>The transition team announced that Sonal’s work is on the Technology, Innovation and Government Reform panel<\/span><\/font><\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n

    When I found out that Sonal would be working on tech issues<\/a>, not foreign policy or personnel issues, I thought this would quiet criticism<\/strong> <\/span><\/font><\/strong>since it made her past affiliations less relevant. However, as with point #1, there was little acknowledgement of this from the other side. <\/p>\n\n

    <<\/p>\n\n

    p>\n<\/p>\n\n

    <\/p>\n\n

    3<\/span><\/p>\n\n

    Former senator <\/strong>Rick Santorum<\/strong><\/a> wrote an editorial calling Shah “the elephant in the room”<\/strong><\/span><\/font><\/strong> where he said:<\/p>\n\n

    Shah should condemn the VHP and its actions soon. If she doesn’t, keeping her on – or, more ominously, giving her a post in the new administration – would send the message that the president-elect does not think the VHP is a radical organization<\/span><\/font>. And this is a president-elect who is trying to “change” the image of the United States in the Islamic world with a foreign policy more sensitive to Muslim concerns. [link<\/a>]<\/blockquote>\n\n

    Santorum is generally known for his extreme and intolerant views<\/a>, so if matters had stopped there, I think she could have ignored the piece without much political cost. The problem is that Santorum’s remarks took the issue out of the desi context where it could be contained, and brought them to a wider audience.<\/p>\n\n

    4<\/span><\/p>\n\n

    <\/strong><\/strong>A blogger at the National Journal picked up the story with a post titled “Shah Pick Stirs Widespread Controversy.” <\/strong><\/span><\/font><\/strong><\/p>\n\n

    <\/span><\/font><\/strong>The National Journal is a center-left publication, owned by the Atlantic, whose core audience is DC insiders<\/a>. Given that context, a story which framed Shah as attracting criticism from the left and the right, and which stated that “the controversy could put to rest any speculation that Shah might be shortlisted for a top Cabinet job<\/a><\/span><\/font>” must have been most unwelcome. <\/p>\n\n

    Note that neither Santorum nor the National Journal have picked up on the fact that she was a member of the VHPA governing council.This leaves Shah room to take the initiative, it also means that things could get more awkward for her.<\/p>\n\n

    Recently, Sonal sent out an email which said she was under pressure as a result of this publicity. This email has now been removed from the blog post<\/a> where I read it earlier, and it seems that Sonal’s friends and allies are rallying to her side, encouraging her to stay on. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    At the same time that one report mentions Sonal as a possible cabinet choice, Sonal seems to be under pressure as a member of the transition team as a couple of mainstream media outlets started to write about her. I … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5549"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5549"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5549\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}