Mandela no more a Terrorist! Hurrah!

So, finally, the US government, through a new bill written by President Bush, has taken Nelson Mandela (and other members of the ANC) off its terror watch list. Thank God, we must now be safer, although I imagine that Dick Chenney doesn't still think it is a good idea. If anything, this sordid reality of US international politics--in taking a whole of 18 years since the "unbanning" of the ANC in South Africa, and 14 years after the Party won legitimate, popular elections in South Africa, to remove it from the so-called terror list--must teach us to be dubious of the US government's (and its allies') characterization of any individual or group as "terrorist." They were wrong about ANC and Mandela, and should apologize to South Africa because America was on the wrong side of history on the matter of South African decolonization and independence. Just removing Mandela's name from the stupid list is not enough.