Dr. James Zogby

James Zogby: Hi, I'm James Zogby and welcome to "Viewpoint." Tonight we'll discuss the latest on the surge on oil prices with an economist.

And the former principal of the academy on the controversy over that New York City Arabic language public school.

But first I want to welcome U.S. representative Dennis Kucinich who joins us live from Capitol Hill.

He's a five-term senator and a former mayor of Cleveland and two-time presidential candidate.

Earlier this month congressman Kucinich introduced 35 articles of impeachment against President Bush.

The vote was 251 to 166 to refer the articles to a committee which many observers conclude is simply a way of burying it since it will never see the light of day there.

Of the 35 articles, about half deal with Iraq, five deal with civil liberties and four with abuses of executive power and the rest with a range of issues from Katrina to global warming.

At the end of each article this is what congressman Kucinich uses.

Let me put them up on the screen.

In all of these actions and decision, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President and Commander in Chief, and subversive of the constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.î

Congressman, thank you for joining us.

Dennis Kucinich: Thank you, James Zogby, it's a pleasure and honor to be with you on your show, "Viewpoint."

JZ: Those are tough words.

How did Congress greet them?

DK: They were referred to committee and I actually made the motion to refer to committee and there are 35 articles so you want people to have the time to read them.

The greatest offense is lying to Congress to lead us into a war.

And there are many specifications to that charge.

And we are now in a war that has cost the lives of over 4,000 of our brave young men and women.

The lives of over 1 million innocent Iraqis, and the destruction of our domestic agenda.

We really need to insist on the rule of law on truth in order to save our democracy.

So that's why I introduced those articles.

JZ: And from what we're hearing, they won't come out of committee.

What do you think the likelihood is any action will be taken and if not, what will you do about it?

DK: Well, it's already been made clear to me that the leadership of Congress said they have no interest in pursuing impeachment.

I think it's a strategic and dangerous mistake which upsets the balance of power in Washington.

That helps feed an imperial presidency and demolishes checks and balances and the position of Congress in court and quality.

I've said if there's no hearing then I will proceed to reintroduce articles when Congress returns in the first week of July or the second week of July.

JZ: The house leadership made a decision not to act.

It was a political decision.

Was it a smart political decision?

DK: I think anytime Congress sets aside its power and in the constitution there are seven places in the constitution where the power for power of impeachment was given to the Congress, not to punish someone for making a mistake, but for punishing high crimes and misdemeanors.

Congress has the obligation to enforce its constitutional position, and what it's done by saying even before we took power as Democrats, by the presumptive speaker saying impeachment is off the table, we essentially have licensed the abuse of power and encouraged them not to comply with subpoenas or appear before the committees or produce evidence and documents.

This then breaks down that Congress' critical role.

And it is further insulates an imperial presidency.

JZ: One of our friends wrote a piece yesterday from the campaign for America's future.

I want to put up to on the screen what Bob concluded in his piece.

He said the congress did not act, this is the language he used.

ìThus, Congress must formally object to President Bush's abuses or it risks by ëindifference or quiescenceí contributing to the powers of our imperial presidency.î but Congress is going to do that.

They've already made it clear that they think this is not a good use of the last year of the President, his term in office.

They've said that it's not something that they want to run on in November.

And so they are not going to act.

As I read your articles, it is maddening.

It's all stuff we knew, but when you see it all in so many pages, about 60-something pages, it is maddening the degree to which laws were broken and secret decisions were made that resulted in everything from torture to abuse of executive power with regard to the firing of people and playing around with oil prices, etc., this has been a -- you call it an imperial presidency, I think one might go further than that.

DK: The thing I'm concerned about.

It's not whether or not someone likes the President or not or likes the speaker of the house or not.

It's about whether we love the Constitution or abide by the Constitution to which we take a solemn oath to protect and defend.

And chapter and verse there have been violations of law both U.S. federal code and international law which are in violation of our constitution and the President has to be held to account and if we refuse we are accomplices, so I'm hopeful that even at this late date that we will not see that there's a time limitation on the provision of U.S. law and that in fact the judiciary committee will hold hearings.

I'll be back in the second week of July with articles that will further substantiate the importance of proceeding through to defend the Constitution.

If they decide to tell the President he's impeached or not, that's another issue, but to not even hold hearings and say we can't even look at that.

This is one of the reasons why the Congress of the United States is held in such low regard all across the country.

JZ: There were several articles you had to deal with abuses of executive authority.

Some of them dealing with the making of secret laws an others that are known here in Washington but I'm not sure how well known around the world, the use of what's called the signing statement literally to pass a bill, congress passes a bill, the President signs it but in the signing of it says I'm not bound to honor this bill and in and that provision.

DK: He literally takes out a pen and decides which sections of the law he's going to go with and picks and choose.

Wouldn't we all like to pick and choose what laws we abide by?

The President has decided there are certain areas of the law he is not going to abide by even though Congress passed them.

This is a constitutional question.

The Congress makes the laws.

The President executes the laws.

The President cannot be both legislative and executive branch simultaneously.

This is a question of checks and balances and if Congress fails to assert its legislative authority and oversight which is in some cases superior, we have done what -- we've undermined the historic position of the United States Congress.

JZ: Tell me something, do you see this as a function of the current President or is there a barrier being broken or a standard being set that will then accrue to future Presidents?

DK: You are 100% right, and this is why I introduced the articles.

First, to create an historic record.

Second, to make sure we make an attempt to hold this will administration accountable.

But also to establish a record where future Presidents could look and say well, I cannot go down the path of this President because if I do I could end up being impeached.

So we need to send a signal to the next President, that an attempt to grab power is not going to be tolerated.

We need to in a sense regain the position of co-equality and stop the abuse of power otherwise we're before square one, which was the constitution back to the time of wanting use of the war power and being able to essentially put the whole British empire at risk because of his capricious use of the power of the king.

We don't have kings here.

JZ: If you want to call it's 001-overseas.

1-800... if you're here in the states.

JZ: Do you have any supporters, Congressman?

DK: There's many members of congress who have indicated an interest.

Some have signed on.

Congresswoman Wallsy, Lee and Congressman Wexler signed up.

Congressman Ellison and Farr and Clay.

There are members that as they read them, they decide that they think they should be part of this.

So I think it's important for members to read the articles.

And I would ask your viewers, go to the web, read your articles and if you have a member of Congress that you want to contact to ask to do the same thing and support it, please do that.

JZ: We're going to put the website up on the screen so viewers can know where to go and look.

I want to ask you about a separate question right now.

There was a whole lot of uproar across the country when we discovered the extensive use of secret wiretapping that was going on with the complicity of phone companies that were literally listening in on phone calls of average Americans all across the country.

The uproar subsided, congress took to legislate and now legislation has been passed which pretty much gave the administration cart Blanche.

How did that happen?

How did we go from uproar and outrage to acquiescence in a matter of month?

DK: Well the democratic leadership in the house capitulated.

We gave the telephone companies get out of jail free cards and got rid of the Fourth Amendment which provides all of us protects us from search and seizure.

And now the government has clear access to people's telephone calls, contents and emails not with standing the protections.

There are exceptions as there often are in law that would enable the government to get the information and then use it not withstanding what a court may decide after the fact.

This is really a dangerous moment in American history, our government has tried to assume powers that democratic governments do not assume, and yet some Congress members think it's OK and I think the fourth amendment is more than a piece of paper.

The government ought to stay out of people's email and private affairs unless they have a reason to think there's a criminal intent or action going on and then you go to court.

Then you let the court make the decision.

The government doesn't do the reaching in.

JZ: Thank you.

I have a couple of people holding on the phones.

Time for a few calls.

JZ: Let's do it.

Let's go to Texas for our first caller.

Caller: Congressman Kucinich, I applaud your efforts to indict these criminals and I want you to know that I have financially contributed to your campaign as well as Ron Paul's campaign.

And I want to say that you know, these guys, the reason they won't impeach is because these other Democrats want to preserve these same fires for their Presidents and what are

your viewpoints on the contributions to AIPAC and Israel to these unnecessary wars that we're involved in?

JZ: Congressman, one question to answer.

Thank you for the call.

DK: Let me say that I have spoken to people who are Israeli citizens who reject what the Bush administration is doing in the Middle East, who believe that by not taking an even handed approach the Bush administration has contributed to making peace much more difficult.

That we have people in the American Jewish community and organizations such as Peace Now and Brutsedik who are very adamant about taking a new direction and transport rights of the Palestinians.

So there's no monolith out there, whatís important is for people of good will and like minded and in pursuit of peace and justice come together so that we can help our Israeli and our Palestinian brothers and sisters reconcile their differences, but to do it in the context of protecting the basic human rights of the Palestinians and you can also assure security for the Israelis.

This shouldn't be hard to do.

It's just hard to do because there's one group of people that has enormous influence and they are using it to keep us from coming together.

JZ: Next call is from Mississippi.

Caller?

-- is from Mississippi, caller?

Caller: Yes.

Yes, sir, thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Kucinich for actually trying to defend the Constitution, and I remember how mad I was when President Nixon was actually pardoned.

Did that set a bad precedent for what's going on now? That Presidents think if they do something wrong they don't have to answer to anybody.

And I want you to continue to push for this impeachment because it's never the wrong time to do the right thing.

DK: I like the way that fellow said it.

There's never a wrong time to do the right thing.

I like that, thank you.

JZ: Florida?

Caller?

Hello?

Florida?

Caller: Hello.

Yes, your question.

Caller: If I support Dennis 110%.

My question is this.

With the articles of impeachment, with all the evidence against this president, isn't it incomprehensible that the house and senate should now pass this new FISA bill?

DK: Absolutely.

What we're talking about is spying on Americans.

There can't be anything more serious in a democratic society than to come to an understanding that our government has gone and spied on American citizens and tapped their phones.

My God, I mean, that's not democratic, that's something out of a fascist government.

We have to save our democracy and that's one of the things mentioned, the articles of impeachment that they conspired to deprive Americans of their fourth amendment rights.

It's not just a piece of paper.

JZ: There are more calls holding but Congressman Conyers had said at one point that it was important to establish the record.

Seems he was counter posing that with either holding hearings or proceeding with actual impeachment.

How important would it be to simply establish the record?

Is that enough?

DK: That's one of the reasons I introduced the article but in addition to that the judiciary committee has the ability to compel witnesses to come forward and to ask questions.

This is what this country needs this.

We need to get to the truth and then we can style.

America needs a time of truth and reconciliation.

We don't even know the truth.

It's OK, I made these charges and articles of impeachment.

Many people believe them to be true, there's a lot of documentation but the committee process is a chance for all of America to watch the discussion and watch one article after

another get a review.

Unless that happens we're looking at an administration that essentially will get away with murder.

Because actually what's happened is we've killed over 1 million innocent Iraqis.

JZ: And you do have hearings underway right now.

You have hearings -- you had hearings, rather, on the Palmgate as it were.

The release of the name of the C.I.A. operative?

DK: But to what end?

JZ: You had that and then the firing of the U.S. attorneys.

And the administration refuses to comply to send witnesses

forward.

How can you compel them if they won't cooperate and Congress won't act?

DK: You're answering your own question, if the congressmen won't act to file contempt, if the administration refuses to let the attorney general prosecute contempt, which is his responsibility or if the district attorney you cannot take congress' complaints and file it in court to me that's an impeachable offense.

This is why when you take it off the table you set the undermining of the system of checks and balances in Washington.

This is a very serious matter because we're licensing this administration's wanton abuse of power.

I stand for the constitution.

JZ: We've got a couple folks in that I want to get in before we take a break.

One from Florida and one from Kansas.

One from Florida then Kansas.

Florida?

Hello?

DK: Yeah.

Hello?

JZ: Hi.

Your question.

Caller: Yeah.

I'm calling from Orlando, Florida, and I wanted to know if either one of you have heard anything about the book "Prosecuting George Bush" and his challenge to the various district attorneys of the different states in the United States why they haven't taken up his challenge to actually bring an action against George Bush?

JZ: Thank you for that.

Let's go to Kansas.

Caller: Yes.

Thank you, Mr. Kucinich.

Do you find it hard to stay in a position you're in with all the crooks around you?

JZ: Well, thank you.

DK: Let me just say there's a lot of good people in the United States Congress.

They just need encouragement and it just takes one person to stand up.

Andrew Jackson said it many years ago, that one person with courage can help make a majority.

So I don't find it hard to be here.

I find it hard when our leadership says we see all these crimes and no, we're not going to look at that.

That's off the table.

What?

You can't pretend to be a democracy if you're not willing to stand up for the institutional prerogatives of Congress and the other part I'm reading the book right now.

I think that he makes some very important points.

This is all about accountability.

And if in fact the President did lie to send us into the war that resulted in the deaths of our soldiers and citizens he has contributed to deaths in a way that would very easily be prosecutable.

JZ: Thank you, so much, Congressman for joining us and the site again is www.kucinich.us, that's where the articles are and take a look.

DK: And if people want to sign up, they can do that there.

JZ: Thank you, so much, Congressman.

DK: Thank you.

JZ: When we come back a conversation about the oil and more of your calls, stay tuned.

James Zogby: Hi, I'm back.

Our next guest is George Abed, he is Special Advisor and Director of the African Middle East of the Institute of International Finance; former Governor of the Palestine Monetary Authority and former Director of the Middle East Department of the International Monetary Funds, thank you for joining us.

George Abed: Thank you.

JZ: Oil prices are at a record high.

The public is largely confused as to what the reasons are.

Back when we had this conversation more than a year ago, people were pointing to everything from lack of oil refineries, and to basic supply and demand, increased demand in China and south Asia.

Now with prices having doubled almost if the last year, without any comparable increase in demand, other forecasts are being looked at.

What is it that accounts for this rather dramatic up to $140 a barrel?

GA: Yes.

It is supply and demand in the fundamental.

The demand has been as you remembering for almost the last 10 years and especially China, India and the Middle East.

The Middle East is the fastest-growing in materials of oil demand, itself, Middle East.

The supply on the other hand has not really been increasing that much.

There has been some disappointment in getting non-OPEC supply, a number of countries such as Russia, Norway, Mexico, their production has begun to decline and as people begin to book supplies for the future they look forward and see nothing but an increase in demand and a limited supply so that the spare capacity shrinks further and further.

And people begin to beg for the price so they can have enough oil for themselves as they need it going forward.

Now there's no doubt that the very sharp increases in the last few months have been fed in part by panic and fear, in part by certain shortages arising from some disruptions such as Nigeria and declines in these other oil producing countries as well, and on top of that from some speculation, let's call it, driving up the prices.

But we cannot say that the speculators are driving up the prices, the speculators are icing on the cake.

They certainly see a trend.

Short supply and prices rising.

They ride the wave.

JZ: Explain how this works.

Israel, defense minister.

I guess he's the defense minister.

GA: Prime Minister and former Defense Minister.

JZ: Says one day we'll have no choice but to bomb Iran.

Oil prices go up 8%.

No disruption in supply, nothing really occurred other than a threat.

Why would that drive up prices to that degree in a single day over just saying it?

GA: Well, the price of oil is not a spot price.

It's the price that those who need oil are willing to pay for supplies of a month or three months, and that's what gets included in the market.

So people want to acquire enough oil to meet their requirements and avoid getting caught in the crisis if indeed Israel bombs Iran and Iran takes out 2 1/2 to 3 million barrels a day and then countries have to reserve to their own oil reserves and --

JZ: So it is speculation but speculation based on anticipation of what the supply might be should x, y, or z occur?

GA: Yes.

In my personal view probably added $10,-$20 in the last increase in the price.

Speculators see a trend coming, and they ride the wave of price increases and anticipating so the price increases hoping to make money out of the underlying trend itself but the

underlying trend is no doubt in the minds of all those who have studied the situation that it really is just the surging demand throughout the world against a shrinking spare capacity and limited supply.

JZ: What to do about it?

There's been calls for increased drilling offshore, drilling in Alaska, the Anwar fields.

Some have said you have to regulate speculation, regulate the bidding process itself and put limits on that.

And let me put something up on the board.

This was an interesting poll the National Journal did of members of congress Democrats and Republicans and gave them four options.

I thought it was interesting the difference between the two parties.

It asked when you should raise taxes on oil companies, Democrats 8.2, 7.0 republicans.

This is out of 10.

They kind of agreed on that.

Drilling in Anwar. .9 Dem, 9 out of 10 Republicans.

Reduce ethanol mandatory dates, Democrats not interested in that but Republicans were very interested in that.

Tightening fuel efficiency standards almost 9-10 Democrats saying that and less than half Republicans.

There's a difference in the way the two parties view the issue.

Who is right on this?

What would be the best route to go?

Increased drilling?

Tightening up the standards or is there something we're missing here?

GA: I think when you have an upcoming crunch in supply and demand you have to work on both sides.

No doubt further drilling in areas that have not been explored would provide additional supply but also the U.S. could improve efficiency.

Despite the fact people here are shocked by $4.25 when they go to fill up their cars, the U.S. has the lowest price of any industrial countries in terms of the gasoline that the consumer buys at the pump.

Norway which exports an enormous amount of oil and accumulates an oil fund of about $350 billion.

The gallon of gasoline in Norway is about $8.

In many country in Europe it's about $8 or $9.

So it's still a long ways from taxing, let's say, petroleum products officially to reduce demand, so you need to work definitely on a supply but the most effective way to address the issue of energy is really through conservation.

That comes first of all by raising the price up a extent that the consumer begins to cut back on his or her consumption and starts to build a better efficiency into the production process.

In Europe for example, after the increase in prices in the 1970's, they improved efficiency to the point where theyíre 30%-40% more efficient in using energy, more efficient.

JZ: Certainly the Gulf States are doing well.

Much better than they were before.

But also paying a price because the dollar is ñ their economies are pegged to the dollar and the cost of oil for them is the sale of oil is pegged to the dollar and the dollar is

dropping rather significantly, so they are encountering inflation, increased cost of exportation but industrial countries are taking a hit and that has a ripple effect throughout the world.

Overall, how bad is this situation?

We would have thought years ago oil goes to $1 or $2 a gallon; the economies of the world are in big trouble.

It's now $4 here, $8 or $9 in other countries but how big is the hit and what are the dangers in the future?

GA: The global economy the G.D.P. of all countries in the world is about $40 trillion.

This year if the price is still elevated as they are, the rest of the world would transfer to OPEC, the exporters or producers of oil about $1 trillion.

That goes out of the pockets of the consuming nations to the pockets of the producing nations.

And this actually put a damper, definitely on the expenditure levels and incomes of the industrial companies and developing companies that don't have oil, so it disease have a dampening effect on the economy and could further the slowdown we have in other places of the world.

The other thing is for the oil producing countries themselves Indonesia, Egypt, Venezuela, so on.

Doesn't matter too much because they can spend the money but this much money is too much of a good thing almost for the smaller countries.

I just returned from the gulf where struggling economies huge torrential flow of dollars coming into their economy.

As you said the currency's back to the dollar so they have to introduce interest rates in line with the U.S. easing policy and when they do this at the same time they are pumping a lot of money into the company and bidding up the prices of material and labor and goods everywhere and causing huge inflation.

They cannot fight it.

At the same time the money that's coming in, they cannot use all of it.

They have to accumulate it as you have seen in the press in sovereign wealth funds and that cause it is spotlight to be focused on them more and more.

I'm not sure they are comfortable with that much attention, at the same time the money coming in is feeding into domestic inflation and causing a huge dilemma for them because it is pegged to the dollar.

So because they are not comfortable with the situation, of course they like the money coming in, but they are not comfortable with the situation they are in.

JZ: If you are calling from overseas, 001-5056, if you're calling from here 1-800--528-2090.

One of the interesting things about this increase in funds and what they do with it is the amount of Arab investment that I'm seeing both in their own infrastructure, something that had not been done with the last oil boom and also investment within the Arab region and countries in some proximity to them, Pakistan, etc.

I remember the Arab human development report that came out some years ago was decrying the fact that the lack of intra-Arab investment is no longer the problem.

Is that leaving the other countries or trickling down into Egypt, Morocco, other countries or is it not?

Is it having a beneficial effect?

GA: Absolutely.

First of all.

There are remittances from the oil exporting countries to the countries that supply the labor.

JZ: From the expatriates who are working.

GA: - who are working, Palestinians, Jordanians, others who are working in the oil-producing countries, there's something like $6 billion-$8 billion a year that got transferred to these poorer countries that donít have as much oil-- and I published a number of papers decrying the fact that direct investment by the oil exporters into the neighboring countries was very, very low for a long, long time.

The oil exporting countries are having more money to invest and they are looking around the neighborhood to see where they could invest and secondly the recipient countries, the

countries that are receiving this investment have taken up a number of domestic reforms such as improving the environment and liberal leasing the economy to a point where as this investment becomes much more productive.

Egypt last year for example, had foreign investment including for privatization of banks of $11 billion to $12 billion.

Same thing with Morocco, Tunisia, Jordan, and other countries in the region, indeed.

JZ: What does this portend for the long haul? That amount of money be point guard relocated from one part of the world to another part of the world and then being recycled out in terms of investment in the surrounding area, does it mean a catching up?

Does it mean a good thing or a concentration of wealth in among certain classes or how does one look at this development?

GA: Well, in a way, it is a rebalancing act.

I mean, the U.S. is running a huge current deficit and that's being filled in essentially by Asia, especially China, to some extent Japan and the oil exporting countries, as long as the U.S. consumes more than it produces somebody else has to provide the financing so the funds invested by the oil exporters into the mature economies like U.S. and Europe is a way of facilitating the rebalance in global imbalances -- that's one.

The other thing is where capital is needed, capital is moving, so to speak.

For example, in the U.S., the recent financial turmoil has led a number of financial institutions to recapitalize after the losses they incurred and indeed the -- the one quick way is to seek funding from the sovereign wealth funds that have cash, so that is one aspect of the situation that has been very, very helpful.

On the other hand some people are concerned that the wealth is accumulating on what is called sovereign states and states would begin to be owning more and more of the as sets in the market's economy and this does perhaps bother some people.

Although we have not seen indication that sovereign wealth funds have actually misbehaved in a --

JZ: Caller from Canada, your question?

Hello?

JZ: Yes, your question.

Caller: I'm calling from Canada.

My name is [inaudible]

Mm-hmm?

Caller: I am from -- [inaudible] I don't really have time to understand why prices jumping so high in a very short time and how Mr. Bush and his group related to it.

Also besides I would like to know why Americans are searching for oil on own land and also why ñthey not try to be so more conservative about using energy, especially the gas.

GA: That's a lot of topics, but let me just pull one.

There's been a lot of effort over the last several years to find blame.

Sometimes it was on the Arab oil sheiks, other times it was blamed on the Bush administrations and their ties to oil companies.

Can one localize the blame in that way or is there something broader going on here?

GA: Not really.

I think the reasons for the -- is diffuse, this year, 2008, the U.S. is expected to reduce its oil consumption by about half a billion barrels a day and you have China and other emerging economies raising their demand for oil by about 1.5 million barrels a day. This has been building up for some time.

China, for example, up until 1993 was several sufficient in oil producing about $3.5 million barrels a day and consuming that much and now producing only four and using 8.

So this demand that came on stream came on in the last 10 or 15 years from China, only if you look at the Middle East, the same thing.

India about 1 million barrels a day increase.

As long as you used capacity it was fine.

No pressure on prices but as you approach spare capacity of only 1.5 to 2 million barrel as day the spare capacity is only about 2.5% of the total and when you're operating on such very thin spare capacity the people who need to use oil going forward begin to book the oil a month, two months, a year from now and willing to pay much more since they are afraid there may not be enough oil there and any small crisis could really upset the balance and make that spare capacity disappear overnight, so there is the uncertainty and fear about potential supply.

JZ: Thank you so much for joining us.

Up next is going to be Debbie Almontaser, former principal of New York City's first Arabic public school and the controversy that is surrounding that school.

Thank you for being with us.

We'll be right back with Debbie Almontaser.

Jim Zogby: Welcome back, I'm Jim Zogby, my next guest is Debbie Almontaser, she's the former principal of the Khalil Gibran International Academy, New York City's first public school dedicated to the study of the Arabic language and culture.

17-year veteran of the New York City public school system known as a bridge builder among Muslims, Christians and Jews in New York City.

Currently serves as director of special projects in the New York City Department of Education.

She was forced to step down as principal of the Gibran Academy last August.

I want to tell that story and get her reaction to it but she's joining us now live from our studio in New York.

Thank you so much for being with us, Debbie.

Debbie Almontaser: Thank you, James.

JZ: The idea was hatched about three years ago and then about a year and a half ago the Department of Education approved it.

And at that point things began to fall apart almost rather quickly.

Daniel Pipes and ìThe New York Sunî and "The New York Post" took on this issue and created a bit of hysteria.

It was ìMadrasa comes to Brooklynî and all the rest of it.

You were forced to resign and take another post and the school opened be another principal who didn't even speak Arabic and it has not gone well, the "New York Times" did a rather excellent piece describing the fact that the school under the new leadership didn't come off as one might have hoped, as you might have hoped it would have come off.

So now there's a sort of re-examination of the whole thing.

To see a dream become a nightmare.

Talk to us a little about what it's been like for you personally to go through this?

DA: Well, Jim, as an educator and Arab-American leader in New York City, someone whose spent a great deal of time building bridges between diverse communities and really dedicating my life to the public school systems as an educator.

You know, to have something like this happen was deeply disturbing.

As well as disappointing.

Being that so many people know who I am and what I represent, the fact that I am a mother of a national reservist who served at ground zero for six months.

The fact that I have a large number of family members who have served in the military, five of my nephews have all been deployed to Iraq.

Several other members of my family who are in the New York police department.

All of this information never made it into any of the information that was spun out there about this school.

And to see myself, you know, turned into this caricature that did not resemble who I am and what I stood for was deeply, deeply disturbing and sad because this is not what America is about.

It's about encouraging and celebrating the efforts of many people of different faiths and traditions and cultures to come to this country and to carve out something called the American dream.

JZ: I've dealt with the cast of characters that you're dealing with now for many years, and I was stunned when I saw the statements that they made about you personally, and about the school.

As just horrifying and bigoted, on face value bigoted.

I was struck by that.

One of the comments that Daniel Pipes made was the very teaching of Arabic, learning Arabic implies learning a Pan-Arab and Pan-Islamist mindset that you couldn't do it without inculcating these kinds of extremist values and he at one point described

something about the biggest danger is not the extremist Muslims, it's the moderate Muslims like you because you're subverting the society in a gentle way.

A gentle kind of subversion.

Were there people in leadership roles who understood that this was just patent bigotry, and not anything more sophisticated than that -- bigotry, not anything more?

DA: From the very start when this school was approved in February of 2006, um 2007, I'm sorry.

The support was incredible.

The Department of Education, the mayor's office was incredibly supportive.

And felt New York City would benefit from such a school being in this city, Unfortunately, they were not prepared for such heinous attacks on the school as well as on me, the individual.

And so as much as they tried to stand up to some of these claims on Fox news and what have you, it was not enough.

But the support was there from all different communities, the Jewish community, the Christian community.

People within the academic world, people I've worked with for many years who saw the significance and relevance of such a school especially because the school's mission was to develop global citizens who would become bridge builders and ambassadors of peace and hope.

JZ: Let's get callers out there in the conversation; the numbers will be up onscreen.

JZ: There was one episode in particular that got blown up into something really quite large.

We'll call it the T-shirt episode.

It reminded me of the Kevin bacon the six degrees of separation story.

Somebody had seen it at an Arab festival wearing a T-shirt that said ìIntifada, New York City,î it turned out that T-shirt was distributed by an art collector who had an office part-time in a Yemeni-American center that it turned out you were one of the board members of, and you got all tied up into that and the quote that was taken from you when asked what the word intifada means you defined what the word meant and "The New York Post" ran with that.

Describe what I left out in that story and what was done with it, pretty difficult situation.

I remember the headline in "The New York Post."

DA: Well, the Arab organization that you mention is a youth empowerment organization for girls, serving inner city youth, and they were using a space in an organization which I sat on the board to run a summer youth program.

This organization is providing, you know, a resource that is void within the Arab and Muslim communities as well as with the broader communities, teaching young women how to use the arts and media to tell their own stories and have a voice.

What happened was as you described, this T-shirt was at the Arab heritage park festival which they found out about this festival by the intensive research that they did on me as an individual and found out that I was the one who spearheaded Arab Heritage Week, and its inauguration here in New York City in 2005.

So they found out about the event, took a picture of this T-shirt, did their research, and made this tenuous connection that I had something to do with it and should be forced out of the position being that I endorsed such a T-shirt.

The press release was put out there, and the media called the Department of Education, they called me, and I simply said to them this T-shirt and its organization have nothing to do with me or this school.

And therefore, there's really no story here to tell.

I am a principal of this school.

I sit on a board of an organization as many other principals do; this does not have anything to do with my role as principal.

And from that point on "The New York Post" insisted on an interview. The original agreement was to put together a statement, he sent over the questions.

I answered them, the Department of Education press office was supposed to develop it into a statement.

Time ran out.

And at 4:30 they called me, the press office of the department and said you have to do this interview.

It's in your best interest to do the interview.

He's running out of time, and you must do it.

It's either you or he's going to print what was in the press release.

And I made it very clear that "The New York Post" does not have my interest or the school's interest, based on their anti-Arab anti-Muslim sentiment that has continued for years.

So the interview took place, he asked me about the organization and the T-shirt and I simply said to him the organization and its T-shirt have nothing to do with the school or me as the principal, therefore there's really nothing to talk about.

Moving forward into the discussion, he asked me for the root word of the word intifada and I simply said to him, you know, as a reporter, you should have been doing your homework and his response was, I did and I came up with many definitions but I was not able to locate the root word of the word intifada.

While I was on the phone with him there was a press person from the Department of Education on the phone with me who did not jump in and say Debbie, you don't have to respond to this or this is an unfair question.

And therefore, as an educator I simply responded by saying to him the root word is ìshake offî however, you have to understand this word as evolved and developed different means for different mention for different people based to be Palestinians-Israeli conflict where thousands of people have been killed, for many people this word has developed a negative connotation. Moving forward in the interview he then said ìwell we have reason to believe that these young women are training for Gaza-style uprising in New York City.î

[laughter]

And as an educator as a mother, seeing these young women being vilified who don't have the opportunity to go away to camp or be put into these prestigious summer camps, this was a way for them to utilize their time and learn something, and for him to vilify them was something that I simply as an educator and a mother could not see happen and I simply said to him I don't believe these girls are going to be engaging in any violent act.

They are just, you know, in a summer program finding their voice through the arts and media, nothing more, nothing less, and we went on to respond to other questions about the school.

The next day he portrayed me as defending the T-shirt and the girlsí actions in creating the T-shirt.

And he made it seem that I minimized the historical context of the word intifada, and as you can see from my balanced response to him, and knowing full well when I responded that had I wanted to make sure that I maintained neutrality and not plunge myself

into the political arena, by simply giving the root word and further explaining how this word has evolved and means different things for different people --

JZ: And from there it became a terror school and you became a supporter of terrorism and that's what led to your forced resignation.

Listen, we're running out of time but I'm so glad you had a chance to talk us through the whole story.

We're not going to be able to get into any calls but I did want to have you do exactly what you did, which was sort of talk to our international viewers and our local viewers here about what happened.

Tell me just right now quickly because we have little time, are you getting support from the city, is Mayor Bloomberg supporting you because I know you'd worked on a commission with him?

Are you getting support from the city at all?

DA: Absolutely not.

Not from Mayor Bloomberg, in fact Mayor Bloomberg, it was his directive to have me removed, but I am getting extensive support from the broader New York City public, rabbis, ministers, community leaders from different communities have come together

and coalesced and formed a group called ìCommunities in Support of the Khalil Gibran International Academy and Debbie Almontaserî who put up this elaborate website that has information outlining everything that's happened from the beginning to the present.

www.kgia.wordpress.com.

JZ: Thank you, so much, Debbie, we're out of time, sorry for the callers, but I really wanted to have you have a chance to hear this story.

My thanks to Dennis Kucinich, George Abed, and Debbie Almontaser and see you next week on "Viewpoint."