Like most people, I often feel discouraged (and that’s putting it mildly) with “politics as usual.” It seems that Congress suffers from a terminal case of lethargy, and when galvanized, it’s only to engage in an often paralyzing fight back and forth across the aisle, with the inevitable result that either nothing gets done or what is touted as compromise does not even vaguely resemble the original principle being argued. Having said that, and particularly as an attorney, I see this great democracy of ours as a blessing on more levels than I can count. We are a society that sets ideals of freedom and personal liberty, and although we do not always live up to our ideals, still we have the capacity to strive and to improve.
Apparently, politics as usual is not just a problem for America, and sometimes our ideals have unintended consequences.
Take Russia, which, in my opinion, has sunk to a new political low with President Vladimir Putin’s signing of a bill into law barring adoption of Russian orphans by American citizens. Why? Apparently, this is Russia’s way of retaliating against President Obama having signed into law the “Magnitsky Act” barring Russian citizens accused of violating human rights from traveling to the U.S. and from owning real estate and other assets in America.
Really, the Russian Parliament could not find a better means of retaliating against America than enacting a law that will inevitably cause suffering to its own children?
According to a December 27, 2012 report in the New York Times, there are 120,000 children awaiting adoption in Russia, and that in 2011 around 1,000 were adopted into American families. The process of adoption is costly and time-consuming. No doubt few childless couples have the resources to invest in the process. Yet, given the large number of parentless Russian children, it is nothing short of appalling that Mother Russia chooses to work out its political differences with America by enacting a law taking hope of finding a family away from her orphaned and institutionalized children. It is not that there are not parents in other countries that will adopt, but is it justified to cause even one child to lose the possibility of a home just to make a political point?
This law will likely sabotage hundreds of adoptions by Americans that are in process. This means that children who had already met and begun to bond with their prospective new parents will have their hopes shattered for reasons that surely will be incomprehensible to these young victims.
It seems to me a great injustice to children whose lives have already been impossibly difficult. I wish Russia could have found a better political solution.