Sanely free of McCarthyite calling anyone a "traitor" since 2001!
Commenting Rules: Only comments that are courteous and respectful of other commenters will be allowed. Period. You must either open a Google/Blogger.com/Gmail Account, or sign into comments at the bottom of any post with OpenID, or LJ or Typepad or Wordpress or AIM account to comment.
Posting a spam-type URL will be grounds for deletion. Comments on posts over 21 days old are now moderated, and it may take me a while to notice and allow them.
I've a long record in editorial work in book and magazine publishing, starting in 1974, as well as a variety of other work experience, but have been, in recent years, recurringly housebound with insanely painful now-sporadic (when I have meds) gout, an enlarged heart, and other health problems, particularly including lifelong recurring major clinical depression and bipolar disorder. I'm also sometimes available to some degree as a paid writer or researcher. I'm available as a fill-in Guest Blogger at mid-to-high-traffic blogs that fit my knowledge set.
If you like my blog, and would like to help me continue to afford food and prescriptions, or simply enjoy my blogging and writing, and would like to support it --
you are welcome to do so via the PayPal buttons. In return: free blog! Thank you muchly muchly. Only you can help! (I'll just handle preventing forest fires while you're busy for a moment.)
Show your support by subscribing for $5/mo.! Free koala bear included! They're so cute!
Additional options! $25/month Supporter subscription!
$50/month Patron subscription!
"The brain is wider than the sky, For, put them side by side,
The one the other will include With ease, and you beside"
-- Emily Dickinson
"We will pursue peace as if there is no terrorism and fight terrorism as if there is no peace."
-- Yitzhak Rabin
"I have thought it my duty to exhibit things as they are, not as they ought to be."
-- Alexander Hamilton
"The stakes are too high for government to be a spectator sport."
-- Barbara Jordan
"Under democracy, one party always devotes its chief energies to
trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule --
and both commonly succeed, and are right."
-- H. L. Mencken
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."
-- William Pitt
"The only completely consistent people are the dead."
-- Aldous Huxley
"I have had my solutions for a long time; but I do not yet know how I am to arrive at them."
-- Karl F. Gauss
"Whatever evils either reason or declamation have imputed to extensive empire,
the power of Rome was attended with some beneficial consequences to mankind;
and the same freedom of intercourse which extended the vices, diffused likewise
the improvements of social life."
-- Edward Gibbon
"Augustus was sensible that mankind is governed by names; nor was he deceived in his
expectation, that the senate and people would submit to slavery, provided they were
respectfully assured that they still enjoyed their ancient freedom."
-- Edward Gibbon
"There exists in human nature a strong propensity to depreciate the advantages, and to magnify
the evils, of the present times."
-- Edward Gibbon
"Our youth now loves luxuries. They have bad manners, contempt for authority.
They show disrespect for elders and they
love to chatter instead of exercise.
Children are now tyrants, not the servants, of their households. They
no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents,
chatter before company, gobble up their food, and tyrannize
their teachers."
-- Socrates
"Before impugning an opponent's motives, even when they legitimately may be impugned, answer his arguments."
-- Sidney Hook
"Idealism, alas, does not protect one from ignorance, dogmatism, and foolishness."
-- Sidney Hook
"Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted."
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson
"We take, and must continue to take, morally hazardous actions to preserve our civilization.
We must exercise our power. But we ought neither to believe that a nation is capable of perfect
disinterestedness in its exercise, nor become complacent about particular degrees of interest
and passion which corrupt the justice by which the exercise of power is legitimized."
-- Reinhold Niebuhr
"Faced with the choice of all the land without a Jewish state or a Jewish state without all the
land, we chose a Jewish state without all the land."
-- David Ben-Gurion
"...the proscribing any citizen as unworthy the public confidence by laying upon him
an incapacity of being called to offices of trust and emolument, unless he profess or renounce this
or that religious opinion, is depriving him injuriously of those privileges and advantages
to which, in common with his fellow citizens, he has a natural right; that it tends also
to corrupt the principles of that very religion it is meant to encourage, by bribing,
with a monopoly of worldly honours and emoluments, those who will externally profess
and conform to it; that though indeed these are criminals who do not withstand such
temptation, yet neither are those innocent who lay the bait in their way; that the
opinions of men are not the object of civil government, nor under its jurisdiction;
that to suffer the civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the field of opinion
and to restrain the profession or propagation of principles on supposition of their
ill tendency is a dangerous fallacy, which at once destroys all religious liberty,
because he being of course judge of that tendency will make his opinions the rule of
judgment, and approve or condemn the sentiments of others only as they shall square
with or differ from his own; that it is time enough for the rightful purposes of civil
government for its officers to interfere when principles break out into overt acts
against peace and good order; and finally, that truth is great and will prevail if
left to herself; that she is the proper and sufficient antagonist to error, and has
nothing to fear from the conflict unless by human interposition disarmed of her
natural weapons, free argument and debate; errors ceasing to be dangerous when it is
permitted freely to contradict them.
-- Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, Thomas Jefferson
"We don't live just by ideas. Ideas are part of the mixture of customs and practices,
intuitions and instincts that make human life a conscious activity susceptible to
improvement or debasement. A radical idea may be healthy as a provocation;
a temperate idea may be stultifying. It depends on the circumstances. One of the most
tiresome arguments against ideas is that their 'tendency' is to some dire condition --
to totalitarianism, or to moral relativism, or to a war of all against all."
-- Louis Menand
"The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis."
-- Dante Alighieri
"He too serves a certain purpose who only stands and cheers."
-- Henry B. Adams
"The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the
poor to beg in the streets, steal bread, or sleep under a bridge."
-- Anatole France
"When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle."
-- Edmund Burke
"Education does not mean that we have become certified experts in business or mining or botany or journalism or epistemology;
it means that through the absorption of the moral, intellectual, and esthetic inheritance of the race we have come to
understand and control ourselves as well as the external world; that we have chosen the best as our associates both in spirit
and the flesh; that we have learned to add courtesy to culture, wisdom to knowledge, and forgiveness to understanding."
-- Will Durant
"Glimpses do ye seem to see of that mortally intolerable truth; that all deep, earnest thinking is
but the intrepid effort of the soul to keep the open independence of her sea; while the wildest
winds of heaven and earth conspire to cast her on the treacherous, slavish shore?"
-- Herman Melville
"The most important political office is that of the private citizen."
-- Louis D. Brandeis
"If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable."
-- Louis D. Brandeis
"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both."
-- Louis D. Brandeis
"It is an error to suppose that books have no influence; it is a slow influence, like flowing water carving out a canyon,
but it tells more and more with every year; and no one can pass an hour a day in the society of sages and heroes without
being lifted up a notch or two by the company he has kept."
-- Will Durant
"When you write, you’re trying to transpose what you’re thinking into something that is less like an annoying drone and more like a piece of music."
-- Louis Menand
"Sex is a continuum."
-- Gore Vidal
"I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should
make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibit the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state."
-- Thomas Jefferson, letter to the Baptists of Danbury, Connecticut, 1802.
"The sum of our religion is peace and unanimity, but these can scarcely stand unless we define as little as possible,
and in many things leave one free to follow his own judgment, because there is great obscurity in many matters, and
man suffers from this almost congenital disease that he will not give in when once a controversy is started, and
after he is heated he regards as absolutely true that which he began to sponsor quite casually...."
-- Desiderius Erasmus
"Are we to have a censor whose imprimatur shall say what books may be sold, and what we may buy? And who is thus to dogmatize religious opinions for our citizens? Whose foot is to be the measure to which ours are all to be cut or stretched? Is a priest to be our inquisitor, or shall a layman, simple as ourselves, set up his reason as the rule of what we are to read, and what we must disbelieve?"
-- Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to N. G. Dufief, Philadelphia bookseller, 1814
"We are told that it is only people's objective actions that matter, and their subjective feelings are of no importance. Thus pacifists, by obstructing the war effort,
are 'objectively' aiding the Nazis; and therefore the fact that they may be personally hostile to Fascism is irrelevant. I have been guilty of saying this myself more than once. The same argument is applied to Trotskyism. Trotskyists are often credited, at any rate by Communists, with being active and conscious agents of Hitler; but when you point out the many and obvious reasons why this is unlikely to be true,
the 'objectively' line of talk is brought forward again. To criticize the Soviet Union helps Hitler: therefore 'Trotskyism is Fascism'. And when this has been established, the accusation of conscious treachery is usually repeated.
This is not only dishonest; it also carries a severe penalty with it. If you disregard people's motives, it becomes much harder to foresee their actions."
-- George Orwell, "As I Please," Tribune, 8 December 1944
"Wouldn't this be a great world if insecurity and desperation made us more attractive? If 'needy' were a turn-on?"
-- "Aaron Altman," Broadcast News
"The great thing about human language is that it prevents us from sticking to the matter at hand."
-- Lewis Thomas
"To be ignorant of what happened before you were born is to be ever a child. For what is man's lifetime unless the memory of past events is woven with those of earlier times?"
-- Cicero
"Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it."
-- Samuel Johnson, Life Of Johnson
"Very well, what did my critics say in attacking my character? I must read out their affidavit, so to speak, as though they were my legal accusers: Socrates is guilty of criminal meddling, in that he inquires into things below the earth and in the sky, and makes the weaker argument defeat the stronger, and teaches others to follow his example."
-- Socrates, via Plato, The Republic
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, represents, in the final analysis, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children."
-- Dwight D. Eisenhower
"Reputation is what other people know about you. Honor is what you know about yourself."
-- Lois McMaster Bujold, A Civil Campaign
"Remember, Robin: evil is a pretty bad thing."
-- Batman
"Being evil is not a full-time job."
-- James Lileks
Gary Farber is now a licensed Double Super-Secret Master Pundit.
He does not always refer to himself in the third person.
Did he mention he was presently single?
The lutefisk is dead. Donate via the donation button on the top left
or I'll shoot this gefilte fish.
Current Total # of Donations Since Blog Began: 618
Subscribers to date at $5/month: 30 sign-ups; 24 cancellations; Total= 6
Supporter subscribers to date at $25/month: 7 sign-ups; 3 cancellation; Total= 4
Patron subscribers to date at $50/month: 10 sign-ups; 6 cancellations; Total= 4
And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
And you may find yourself in another part of the world
Farber's First Fundamental of Blogging:
If your idea of making an insightful point is to make fun of people's
names, or refer to them by rilly clever labels such as "The Big Me" or "The Shrub,"
chances are high that I'm not reading your blog. The same applies if you refer
to a group of people by disparaging terms such as "the Donks" or "the pals." (Note: I have to say I don't give that much of a damn any more.)
Farber's Second Fundamental of Blogging:
The more interested you are in scoring a "point" for a political "team," a "side," than in exploring the validity or value of an idea, the less interested I am in what you're saying.
(Note: Partially suspended for the Duration. Later note: forget I ever said this.)
Farber's Third Fundamental of Blogging:
If you see a link on another blog, and use it, credit the blog.
Some places I go:
[weblogs, sites, and columns]
People I've known and still miss include Isaac Asimov, rich brown, Charles Burbee, F. M. "Buzz" Busby, Terry Carr, A. Vincent Clarke, George Alec Effinger, Abi Frost,
Bill & Sherry Fesselmeyer, George Flynn, John Milo "Mike" Ford. John Foyster, Jay Haldeman, Chuch Harris, Mike Hinge, Lee Hoffman, Terry Hughes, Damon Knight, Ross Pavlac, Bruce Pelz, Elmer Perdue, Tom Perry,
Larry Propp, Bill Rotsler, Art Saha, Bob Shaw, Martin Smith, Harry Stubbs, Bob Tucker, Harry Warner, Jr., Jack Williamson, Walter A. Willis, Susan Wood, Kate Worley, and Roger Zelazny.
It's just a start.
And She of whom I must write someday.
You Like Me, You Really Like Me
...Darn: I saw that Gary had commented on this thread, and thought: oh. my. god. Perfect storm. Unstoppable cannonball, immovable object.
-- Hilzoy
Guessing that Gary is ignorant of anything that has ever been written down is, in my experience, unwise.
Just saying.
-- Hilzoy
Where would the blogosphere be without the Guardian? Guardian fish-barreling is now a venerable tradition. Yet even within this tradition, I don't believe there has ever been a more extensive and thorough essay than this one, from Gary Farber's fine blog. Gary appears to have examined every single thing that Guardian/Observer columnist Mary Ridell has ever written. He ties it all together, reaches inevitable conclusion. An archive can be a weapon.
-- Dr. Frank
Isn't Gary a cracking blogger, apropos of nothing in particular?
-- Alison Scott
I usually read you and Patrick several times a day, and I always get something from them. You've got great links, intellectually honest commentary, and a sense of humor. What's not to like?
-- Ted Barlow
...writer[s] I find myself checking out repeatedly when I'm in the mood to play follow-the-links. They're not all people I agree with all the time, or even most of the time, but I've found them all to be thoughtful writers, and that's the important thing, or should be.
-- Tom Tomorrow
Amygdala - So much stuff it reminds Unqualified Offerings that UO sometimes thinks of Gary Farber as "the liberal Instapundit." -- Jim Henley
I look at it almost every day. I can't follow all the links, but I read most of your pieces. The blog format really seems to suit you. It also suits me; I am not a news junkie, so having smart people like you ferret out the interesting stuff and leave it where I can find it is wonderful.
-- Lydia Nickerson
Gary is certainly a non-idiotarian 'liberal'...
-- Perry deHaviland
...the thoughtful and highly intelligent Gary Farber... My first reaction was that I definitely need to appease Gary Farber of Amygdala, one of the geniuses of our age.
-- Brad deLong
My friend Gary Farber at Amygdala is the sort of liberal for whom I happily give three cheers. [...] Damned incisive blogging....
-- Midwest Conservative Journal
If I ever start a paper, Clueless writes the foreign affairs column, Layne handles the city beat, Welch has the roving-reporter job, Tom Tomorrow runs the comic section (which carries Treacher, of course). MediaMinded runs the slots - that's the type of editor I want as the last line of defense. InstantMan runs the edit page - and you can forget about your Ivins and Wills and Friedmans and Teepens on the edit page - it's all Blair, VodkaP, C. Johnson, Aspara, Farber, Galt, and a dozen other worthies, with Justin 'I am smoking in such a provocative fashion' Raimondo tossed in for balance and comic relief.
Who wouldn't buy that paper? Who wouldn't want to read it? Who wouldn't climb over their mother to be in it?
-- James Lileks
Gary is a perceptive, intelligent, nice guy. Some of the stuff he comes up with is insightful, witty, and stimulating. And sometimes he manages to make me groan.
-- Charlie Stross
One of my issues with many poli-blogs is the dickhead tone so many bloggers affect to express their sense of righteous indignation. Gary Farber's thoughtful leftie takes on the world stand in sharp contrast with the usual rhetorical bullying. Plus, he likes "Pogo," which clearly attests to his unassaultable good taste.
-- oakhaus.com
Gary Farber is a principled liberal....
-- Bill Quick, The Daily Pundit
I read Amygdala...with regularity, as do all sensible websurfers.
-- Jim Henley, Unqualified Offerings
Okay, he is annoying, but he still posts a lot of good stuff.
-- Avedon Carol, The Sideshow
The only trouble with reading Amygdala is that it makes me feel like such a slacker. That Man Farber's a linking, posting, commenting machine, I tell you!
-- John Robinson, Sore Eyes
Jaysus. I saw him do something like this before, on a thread about Israel. It was pretty brutal. It's like watching one of those old WWF wrestlers grab an opponent's
face and grind away until the guy starts crying. I mean that in a nice & admiring way, you know.
-- Fontana Labs, Unfogged
We read you Gary Farber! We read you all the time! Its just that we are lazy with our blogroll. We are so very very lazy. We are always the last ones to the party but we always have snazzy bow ties.
-- Fafnir, Fafblog!
Gary Farber you are a genius of mad scientist proportions. I will bet there are like huge brains growin in jars all over your house.
-- Fafnir, Fafblog!
Gary Farber is the hardest working man in show blog business. He's like a young Gene Hackman blogging with his hair on fire, or something.
-- Belle Waring, John & Belle Have A Blog
I bow before the shrillitudinousness of Gary Farber, who has been blogging like a fiend.
-- Ted Barlow, Crooked Timber
Gary Farber only has two blogging modes: not at all, and 20 billion interesting posts a day [...] someone on the interweb whose opinions I can trust....
-- Belle Waring, John & Belle Have A Blog
Gary Farber! Jeez, the guy is practically a blogging legend, and I'm always surprised at the breadth of what he writes about.
-- PZ Meyers, Pharyngula
Gary Farber takes me to task, in a way befitting the gentleman he is.
-- Stephen Green, Vodkapundit
I do appreciate your role and the role of Amygdala as a pioneering effort in the integration of fanwriters with social conscience into the larger blogosphere of social conscience.
-- Lenny Bailes
I'VE BEEN THROUGH IDAHO A BUNCH OF TIMES and enjoyed it, especially after Montana went on long after it had finished making its point, gorgeous as some of its spots are. I'll stand up for the people there, even if I am uneasy at the lack of ethnic diversity there as I am, as a Brooklyn kid, as I am at that of a few western states.
I've thought a lot about the ethnic history in this state, Colorado, I've just found myself in, and noticed that much of it is ugly, and that I've a lot more to catch up on. Riding the bus here is not the same as riding the bus in Brooklyn, my native land. Or even Queens and the rest of the city. There are many other ethnically diverse cities in the US, by nature and definition, and thank Roscoe, but I expect there is a considerable difference between those locales, and those that are more homogenous.
METANARRATIVE ON GORE: This December Rolling Stone piece isn't as well-detailed as some other accounts of the amazing snow job most of the press pulled on Al Gore before I was blogging, but it's worth a note. As I alluded earlier, if you voted against, or dislike, Gore for his policy and political stands, fine, that's your right, and we can discuss those in specific at leisure. I'm just bothered by the job the press did on telling lies about Gore, and the number of people who uncritically bought them, just as, say, lots of people believed Ronald Reagan was a completely vague idiot who couldn't possibly have any serious ideas of his own (and who haven't read the notes for his radio speeches).
There are infinite reasons to dislike, distrust, or disagree with, a specific politician, but the Republic is best served when those opinions are based on actual facts rather than wild and inane distortions reproduced endlessly in an echo chamber, and the fact is that this happens to politiicans of both major parties, due to an endlessly lazy professional press class.
The Arab Street will rise in flames. The "street" in any given Arab country consists of 278 state-sanctioned mullahs already preaching death to the Americans and the Jews, five state-controlled newspaper opinion columnists preaching ditto, 577,000 state security officers making sure nobody says anything to the contrary and 73 million people who would very much like to be living in New Jersey. In Kabul, they cheered and kissed our soldiers. In Baghdad, they'd love to have the chance.
INNOVATION: FROM COMPANIES OR INDIVIDUALS? Microsoft said (in an ad in the Wall Street Journal) that a country's true innovators are its companies. This page disagrees, asserts that it is individuals, and tells the story of Edwin Howard Armstrong, who invented FM radio, significant aspects of AM radio, and died a suicide over his patent fights. I never knew before why US televisions don't have a Channel 1.
2/15/2002 06:08:00 PM |permanent link| | Main Page |
Other blogs commenting on this post
0 comments
ORIENTALISM REVISITED. You probably read this critique of the philosophical children of Edward Said's ground-breaking Orientalism, written by Charles Paul Freund, as it was published in December, stimulated by Said's post-September 11th comments. But it's new to me, and fascinating, so I mention it to anyone else who might find it of interest, and who is as behind as I.
2/15/2002 04:24:00 PM |permanent link| | Main Page |
Other blogs commenting on this post
0 comments
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, reply to a European friend unfamiliar with NG: What shocked me is that NG was always a lovely magazine about local anthropology, sociology, geology, and the like; everything from amazing photos of volcanos to exotic cultures from Silicon Valley to obscure South American tribes. But now it's largely non-stop stasis stuff. (See Virginia Postrel for explanation of latter.) Most of all, it used to have no more place in the political dialogue than a tree. Now it's more or less explaining with every paragraph the political significance of a tree.
This is a change. Given its base, I think it's likely a politically significant change, and I'm very belatedly, years after the fact, noting it.
SPOILED BRATS: here's one. I know there is is still a decent evironmental protection movement out there, but this shithead isn't part of it, and is a part of an appalling outgrowth.
On other fronts, I've recently read some issues of National Geographic for the first time in well over a decade, and been almost as appalled at how politicized, in an idiotic way, it has become. I always, as a kid and later, like everyone, valued the maps, local insight, facts, and, of course, the pretty pictures.
We always joked about how the NA continent is balanced, and prevented from tipping into the ocean, by the weight of National Geographic issues in people's basements on either coast, which, of course, means that North America slides into the Atlantic.
National Geographic's become, I've just belatedly discovered, an extraordinary outlet of propaganda. I may agree with many of the issues at hand, but, migod, they're jamming overt poliitical agitation into every other paragraph. Even when I agree with it, which is the vast majority of the time, I'm shocked at how much the Society editorital staff is stacking the deck, via editorial decisions in the Magazine, in the recent issues I've read.
Environmentalism, in my world, involves making scientifically balanced judgements that weigh alternatives against each other, not simple-minded assumptions that "'nature' as we find it this day is inviolable" or "industy is inherently evil." When did the NGS hire 12-year-old editorial staff? More to come eventually.
INFINITE MATRIX:Yipes. Somehow I'd not plugged this before. Pray take notice. (And then didn't notice, after being offline for two and a half days, that the link was broken; apologies.)
Check out Terry Bisson's daily future "this day in history," Bruce Sterling's weblog, spiffy fiction, a John Clute review, and a kind of mini-Ansible from Dave Langford, among other goodies.
A three-hour epic about elves, dwarfs, wizards and small, hairy-footed hobbits that is only the first chapter in a fantasy trilogy dominated the 74th annual Academy Award nominations this morning, coming away with 13 of them.
Among the nominations for "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" were ones for best picture, best director (Peter Jackson), best musical score (Howard Shore), best cinematography (Andrew Lesnie) and best supporting actor (Ian McKellen). The film, released in mid-December, has also been a huge box-office success, with more than $270 million at the domestic box office.
Gosford Park took seven nominations, including Robert Altman's fifth; whatever will Oliver North think?
The Pakistani authorities today arrested an Islamic militant who had been the main suspect in the kidnapping of the American journalist Daniel Pearl, and said he told them that Mr. Pearl was still alive.
The suspect, Ahmed Omar Sheikh, was arrested in the eastern city of Lahore and then taken to Karachi for further questioning. The authorities declined to give further details, but they said that Mr. Sheikh's account might be true, and that Mr. Pearl, a reporter for The Wall Street Journal, might soon be free.
[...]
The Pakistani intelligence agents detained in the case were retired officials who had close ties with members of the anti-Soviet resistance in Afghanistan during the 1980's, including Osama bin Laden.
Their links to Mr. Sheikh have not been explained by Pakistani officials, who have noted only that the suspect was part of a network of militants who had allies among the main intelligence service, the Inter-Services Intelligence agency.
...In reality, there hasn't been an Iranian Revolutionary Guard in Lebanon since 1984 – Mr Peres is just 18 years late with his facts. As for the missiles, the Hizbollah would like to know where they are.
So why is Lebanon being set up in this way?
[...]
Still the Israelis claim that Iran or Mr bin Laden or Syria are turning Lebanon into a "terror-centre" or – this from Mr Peres again -- a "powder keg".
The reality is quite different. The border hasn't been so quiet in 25 years. Save for a brief attack at Shebaa farms, a terrain of abandoned fields belonging to Lebanon but occupied by Israel since 1967 (the UN says its fate should be decided at a peace conference and puts it on Israel's side of the Blue Line) the only action has been in the air.
Forever since Israel restarted its reconnaissance flights over Lebanon – clear violations of the Blue Line agreement, according to the UN – the Hizbollah have taken to blasting 57mm anti-aircraft rounds into the air over the Israeli border.
Each time a contrail whispers up the pale blue skies towards Beirut, the Hizbollah bang away with their old gun above Kiryat Shmona. They have sent some splinters into the gardens of a kibbutz but it's the sound that is meant to impress. The 57mm rounds, fired from a relic of Stalingrad vintage, explode with a powerful detonation. If Israel's pilots want to rattle the windows of Beirut with their sonic booms, the Hizbollah are saying, then Israel's citizens can endure a few noisy explosions in the sky.
I invite Robert Fisk to find a garden of such a kibbutz, and stand in it, to peacefully enjoy the experience of catching such harmless "splinters." Apparently he's spent such a long time in the Arab world that he has caught that curious disease of believing that if you fire a weapon vertically, your projectile achieves escape velocity, and never falls to earth, and if it somehow should, it is harmless and naught to be concerned with.
General Gaby Ashkenazi was enjoying his Israeli Northern Command's annual dinner when the first reports came in of "three loud explosions" over Kiryat Shmona. Some Israeli children were sent into shelters. The Hizbollah were accused of breaching the Blue Line agreement with their airbursts – it was indeed a violation, just like the Israeli overflights – but no- one was hurt.
Well, that's all right, then.
It's a dangerous game.
Yes. Just a game. The Hizbollah are such a lovable, kooky, fun-loving bunch. BOOM they like to go with their funny harmless 57mm cannon. What fun.
If just one splinter hits an Israeli, shells will come whiffling back across the border.
Darn those Israelis. No sense of fun. They should fire harmless 57mm "splinters" back.
And Robert Fisk should stand where they fall, too. What a scum bag.
The Dominion of Melchizedek (mal-khay-zed'-ek) is a worldwide ecclesiastical and constitutional state. The Dominion of Melchizedek epitomizes the post-modern state.
Read those official statistics, and keep in mind that
55) Population: [a permanent population]:
In accordance with teachings of the Bible, First Chronicles Chapter 21, the Melchizedek leadership refrains from conducting a census of its people; therefore the actual number of Melchizedekians living on earth today is not available for it is not known. Most of the citizens of DOM are dual citizens living in every major country.
The world is a wonderful place. And so is the Dominion. You must go read about it.
61) Human Rights Platform:
The Dominion of Melchizedek is a transnational nation state established to unite the political representatives, the intellectuals, the professionals, those in business, labor and agriculture, the oppressed, and all freedom-loving and aspiring men and women who share the planet Earth.
GARY'S AFRICAN AID PROGRAM. Like everyone online, I've always received a certain amount of spam, despite use of various ISP filtering programs, sometime use of my filters, and so on. Most is boring, a smattering is amusing; I heard from Miss Cleo for a while, recently, and was utterly shocked that her powers did not allow her to detect my lack of interest in said hearing, but apparently they clicked in, as I've not heard from her of late.
For some reason, however, I never received an iteration of the famous Nigerian money scam, a large scale version of the old "bank teller" con, until last week, as regular readers know. Apparently I've gotten on a little list, however, and my main e-address is being circulated, as I've now also heard from, in the past two days, "Abum Bellow," allegedly of -- well, as you'll see below, he doesn't even get the name of his own alleged country right -- and -- best of all -- I've heard from "Mrs Marilo Martina Kabila," the widow of Laurent Kabilia, the late unlamented dictator of Zaire. I can't say how impressed I am that she picked me. No, I just can't say. No, really, I can't.
"Abum" began:
DEAR FRIEND,
I am ABUM BELLO from Zaire presently known as the people democratic republic of Congo.
Well, no, it's been known as the Democratic Republic of Congo since '97, after Kabila overthrow Mobutu Sese Seko. No "People's," as there is no Communist connection, unsurprisingly. But why let a little thing like not knowing the name of your own country stand between our already burgeoning friendship?
I am the first son of late Mrs. Ngozi Glory Bello the former assistant director general of Congo diamond milling corporation. During the time of the late president Lurent Kabila who died last January.
That's January, 2001.
After his death my mother was killed by the rebels because she was a member of the late Kabela's Government. After her death I excaped with my younger ones from our country because it was not safe for us any longer I was able to move my younger one to a nebouring country here in abidjan ivery coast. I got your contact from the office of chamber of commerce and industry here in ivery coast
where we can't spell, and don't end sentences with periods. But, gollygeewhiz, so that's who's giving out my e-address. I guess they got it from my good friend Bimbo Daramola in Nigeria, despite the utterly confidential and top secret nature of our dealings.
As a result of my serious search for a reliable foreign partner, I am delighted to confront you based on a profile conviction about your experience in investment program.
I also would like to frobish your ringtangles.
I now decided to write you as well as let you
know that I need your assistance in helping me to invest my money. Infact I left my country with a reasonable amount of money which belongs to my late mother, after she died in the general hospital in Kinshasha (Capital City) I managed to escape with the sum of US$25 Million dollars (twenty five million dollars) which was in a trunk box I found in her room.
Just lying around. What a surprise that must have been. I bet my mom won't leave a penny over five million in a trunk in her room.
This money belongs to my late mother and it is presently here with me in abidjan ivery coast in cash as well. Hoping you will respond to my call to assist me invest this money because I am still a student.
This is an even lamer explanation for why he needs me than the "I have to follow the rules of our Department" line from "Bimbo." Even a "student" would be able to hire a professional; really, this part of the tease makes no sense. As the prospective scammee, I am insulted. Anyway, he goes on to offer me
20% of the total sum involved and 5% mapped out for any miscellaneous expenses that we may incure [and] The bottom line is that we need to meet here in abidjan to arrange on relocation of the fund. tems of the things I want are: (1) Helping me to bank the money in a safe bank account. (2) Help me to all the residential papers of your country. and giving me direction on how well to invest the money. I look forward for your reply via my mail box,
yours faithfully, abum bello
I dropped Abum a note asking him to please tell me more, but for some inexplicable reason, his address had been disabled. What a damned bad break for both of us.
Mrs. Kabila's missive came with the subject header "INVESTMENT PROPOSAL/CONFIDENTIAL"
From: Mrs Marilo M. Kabila. Tel:(00225)0500-7984 Attn:Gary Farber
Dear,
Hi. This is the part where you fill in the blank, Mrs. Kabila.
I am Mrs Marilo Martina Kabila, from Democratic Republic of Congo.
At least she got the name of her country right.
There is an imformation I would like you to keep very confidential There is sum ammount of money my Husband Late President Laurent Kabila, deposited in a Trans Deplomatic Storage in BUDAPEST(HUNGARY) before he was killed by his Eldest Millitary Son.
I had no idea the Kabila family had intermarried into the Charlie Chan family.
The squable happened as immediately we returned back from our Spain trip.
I just hate those family squables where you kill your father. So declasse.
My husband married us two.I am the second wife. I will not be able to give you the full details that led to that urgly incidents.
Quite right. Urgly family murder squables should be kept private.
The Eldest Son is the current President of our country now.
That would be Joseph.
I am staying in Abijdan, capital of Republic of Cote-D Ivoire,
It's a popular spot.
with my three children for my safty and that of my children. The money in question, is 15 Million U.S. Dollars.
Piddlingly trivial sum. I shan't bother myself for a penny under 40 million.
I can not make the withdrawal of this fund, because my husband registered the Beneficiary of the fund as his (Foriegn Bussiness Patner) and also (Family valuables as the content of the deposit) The documents of the deposit are with me.
Cough. You were supposed to fill out the blanks there, again, Mrs. Kabila. Tsk, tsk, tsk.
What I would want you to do, is to assits me to get the consignment withdrawn from the Trans Deplomatic Storage, and we shall open a small account in a Bank there in your name, and transfer the money to your country, through the account .We shall replace thename Foriegn Patner to your own name, because the code was used for security reason.
And excellent security it is!
You will always get in contact with me through my son rented mobile telephone 00 -225-05-00-79-84.My very son knows about this arrangment.
Is this Number Two Military Son, or Number Three Podiatrist Son?
I will give you the 15% of the money for your assitance.Ther is no risk in this transaction. I will use the remain balance of the money for an investiment in your country for the future of my children.
If you are intrested, and can maintain the very confidential of this transaction,you call me immediately for more clearification, and also note that I am a French woman, but I will not like to involve any French language while this transaction last, as I can speak little english, and my son also speaks english very well.
I'm sorry, but 2.25 million dollars simply isn't sufficient money for me to bother myself about. Nor shall I maintain the very confidential, as I have enough clearification, and most of all because you are a French woman.
Thank you very much. Mrs Marilo Martina Kabila.
Best of luck to you, and do write and let me know how it all works out. I shan't be posting any more of these letters here, have no fear, readers, but if you're interested in such, you can find one huge heaping pile of variants here. Meanwhile, I just found this envelope full of money on the street, and I figure that as readers of Amygdala, you deserve a share....
2/12/2002 01:03:00 PM |permanent link| | Main Page |
Other blogs commenting on this post
0 comments
ANDREWSULLIVAN.COM. One gathers that Andrew Sullivan doesn't code his own text for his site. I gather this primarily from the fact that they are still struggling to find a "quick fix" to the awesomely complex problem of how to change colors. Presumably he types into some sort of template, a la Blogger.
Here's the latest, at the moment I write this, entry at Andrew Sullivan's blog, complete with his links:
The link is to Mr. Sullivan's Sunday Times of London piece. That startled me. Is whomever codes his site, once every six months or whatever, trying to say his piece is dumb? Why link to that word? But presumably Sullivan makes such choices himself, although the deep mysteries of Changing Colors is beyond him, and goodness knows how many days it will take to find the quick fix. It's all very strange.
The actual piece I quite agree with, by the way. I actually agree with Sullivan more than not, which is why I'm so annoyed at him all the times I'm not in agreement, or am being irritated at his obsessions that I do not share, such as obsessively going after Paul Krugman (though I've been in partial agreement with him in some of the specifics, as in when Sullivan made fun of Krugman's even lamer explanation that "I was just another brick in the wall" was a jest, with "stop it, Paul, you're killing me." I admire a great deal about Krugman, but his sense of humor and lack of taking himself seriously have so far not been included; I admire a great deal about Sullivan, but some of his obsessions have so far not been included; of course, it's having different sets of obsessions that makes all of us different folk, and life more interesting, so I'll allow Sullivan to live).
SAVAGE LOVE You know from the nutbar Rev. Lewis Shelton of the "Traditional Values Coalition," right? And sex columnist Dan Savage? They were on CNN's Talkback:
SHELDON: And when you begin to try and say that there is another kind of gender that is called sexual orientation, you are creating a confusion for a child. I think it's despicable what the group has done, the national -- the pediatric group has done in saying that homosexual parenting is OK. It is a dysfunctional lifestyle that can lead to a lot of problems for the life of a child.
SAVAGE: And that is Reverend Sheldon's opinion and he's free to hold that opinion, and I would encourage him not to adopt a child with his boyfriend if he feels that way.
HE CHANGED HIS SHIRT!: Jack Germond, a doyen political reporter, one of the proest of old pros, speaks for his class by perpetuating the "Al Gore changed his shirt! What a loon!" meme in his latest slam at Gore. The Daily Howlernailed Howard Fineman of Newsweek on this back in December, in a piece that absolutely holds up.
Mind, this has nothing to do with Al Gore's politics or policies, or how you or I feel about them. This is about political reporters, because they personally dislike Al Gore, distorting normal behavior into pseudo-evidence of non-existent mental problems or compulsive lack of self-confidence. I don't care if you utterly disagree with any and all of Gore's policy preferences, but it's distressing if you've been given to believe he's a nut because some days he wears a blue suit, some days a brown suit, and some days a casual shirt, or if you believe the lie that he claimed he invented the Internet, or that he habitually exaggerates.
And here Germond goes again, since there are no issues of substance to report, but doing his best to nip in the bud any positive movement towards Gore:
but the core of the problem was the candidate. He changed his shirts and his persona so often that, as the campaign came to an end, many Americans didn't feel comfortable with him. His campaign was too contrived and mechanical; there was no one willing to walk through a wall for him.
Nor has Gore's behavior since the election been comforting. He was clearly entitled to a European respite, but he could have shed the beard before coming back.
Oh, no, horrors! He's wearing a beard! Unclean! Un-American! Weirdo! Cuckoo!
Instead, he continues to wear it in what is being interpreted as a signal of another "new" Gore, this time a laid-back model. What political professionals see here is evidence that the flaws that cost him the 2000 election he should have won were not the kind of flaws that can be corrected. He can talk about "mending fences" in Tennessee, an obvious first step toward 2004. But he cannot shed the image of the contrived candidate too controlled to be human.
There it is. Proof positive Gore is an inhumanly contrived robot: he's wearing a beard.
This is raving loony insanity. If Gore changed nothing, he's be accused of being a robot. Again. If he loosens up and wears a beard, it's evidence of his contrivance. Pray tell, how does one win this game?
BT in court to enforce hyperlink patent. The company will appear in a New York federal court on Monday - it claims anyone who uses the World Wide Web owes it money.
NEXT TIME, REMEMBER, YOU'RE CONTRIBUTING TO SCIENCE:
Oldest fossilised vomit pile uncovered; "Copious amounts" of regurgitated bones are unearthed by palaeontologists in England - the tactic saved horrendous indigestion for ichthyosaurs.
A Washington Post foreign correspondent who reached the remote scene of the attack also reported that a team of U.S. soldiers on the ground investigating the attack prevented him from entering the site and threatened to shoot him if he proceeded.
[...]
Asked about U.S. troops threatening to shoot an American reporter on the scene, Stufflebeem said he had no direct information about the confrontation but doubted that it took place. "To believe that a U.S. American serviceman would knowingly threaten, especially with deadly force, another American is hard for me to accept," he said.
It was bullshit like this that led to the Vietnam war briefings by MACV in Saigon being called "The Saigon Follies" by the press corp. When the military spokesperson tells you absurd lies, why should you believe anything else he tells you?
Does anyone believe an Army Special Forces sergeant or trooper wouldn't point his weapon at a strange guy coming up on the force in a dangerous combat area, and threaten to shoot him if he kept coming? Does anyone believe that this is in fact necessarily wrong? Perhaps Ahmed Shah Masood might have a word of wisdom here. Meanwhile, has Stufflebeam ever been in combat?
A Washington Post reporter who reached the remote scene of the attack was held at gunpoint by U.S. soldiers and prevented from entering the site. The soldiers also barred access to the nearby village where Ahmad and the two other men had lived.
"This is an ongoing military operation," said the soldiers' commander, who would not identify himself, after consulting by radio with his superiors. "If you go further, you would be shot."
"We're trying to find out what happened here, too," he added.
IRAN CAN'T COMPETE WITH NORTH KOREA in the rhetoric game.
After 23 years, though, the sense of brooding menace that pervaded marches of the past had mellowed. This one felt more like a carnival, complete with a gold coin on offer for the best Uncle Sam effigy.
A yellow banner painted with giant letters in Persian was stretched across one overpass.
In the early days of the Islamic Republic it would have been automatically translated as "America is the Greatest Satan." But today the lettering helpfully included its own English translation, reading, "America Is Extremely Naughty."
The action represents an unusual assault at the Inter-Services Intelligence agency, the powerful and semi-autonomous military institution whose ties to Islamic militants have been a problem and an embarrassment for the current and previous governments of Pakistan. [...] General Musharraf's government is searching for a leader of Jaish-e-Mohammad, an Islamic militant organization. But the organization also has ties to Pakistan's intelligence agency, so experts here say it is not a surprise that the investigation would also result in the detention of the former Pakistani agents.
The most prominent of the two men known to have been detained is Khalid Khawaja, until recently a midranking member of the intelligence agency. Mr. Khawaja is not being accused of playing any role in the kidnapping, Pakistani officials said, but has been detained because his past ties to militant groups are thought likely to provide a lead in the case.
Among other things, Mr. Khawaja, a former air force officer, is said by Pakistani officials to have once served as a pilot for Osama bin Laden, who received logistical support from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United States during his work for the anti-Soviet mujahadeen in the 1980's.
He's obviously had high-level protectors -- this is just a given, as one of the two main thrusts and activities of the ISI for twenty years was the building of as much power as possible in Afghanistan (the other being, of course, Kashmir and India); the question now is how the internal politics withion ISI, the military, and the secularists is playing out. An outward sign will be who is thrown to the wolves.
The news of the detentions came as senior Pakistani officials began for the first time to raise the question of whether Mr. Pearl, 38, a foreign correspondent of The Wall Street Journal, had blundered into the attack. The interior minister, Moinuddin Haider, said during the weekend that Mr. Pearl, who disappeared on Jan. 23, on the way to a scheduled meeting with a militant, might have been too unconcerned about his safety.
This shameful nonsense is an attempt at providing a useful distraction for the pro-Musharaf wing of the Pakistani government, which finds this quite embarassing while Musharaff is on his way to Washington.
[...] After expressing early confidence that the case might be solved, Pakistani officials have become much more cautious, and some privately say that their best hope is that Mr. Pearl will be found unharmed in an empty apartment, with the kidnappers having vanished.
"We sure hope it will turn out this way, so no embarassing links back to ISI and our people will be found " Obviously also a public signal to the actual people on the ground.
[...] The kidnapping of Mr. Pearl, and the apparent involvement of an extremist organization, has been a setback to the president, who has enhanced his international reputation by promising and beginning to carry out a crackdown on Pakistan's militant Islamic groups.
It is not the vegetable juice. As for the water salad, the fruit salad which is drunk. Where the fruit and the vegetable enter you can drink, the water type beverage is. The fruit salad which is drunk is. The natural material of 11 types (the fruit juice * vegetable juice) with, taking too much vegetable insufficiency * calorie and the like the dietary life where the person of 20 - 30 generations is disordered is supported tastily.
THE BATTLE OF TORA BORA: This colorful story alleges the US forces badly screwed it up, through lack of good intelligence, lack of good coordination with Afghanis, use of corrupt warlords' troops, lack of coopting of local villagers, arrogance, and various other sins and errors. How accurate or not is the story? I have no idea.
2/10/2002 07:12:00 PM |permanent link| | Main Page |
Other blogs commenting on this post
0 comments
THE SAUDI SERIES: The Washington Post, having concluded the Woodward-Balz series (hey, it was only eight installments), is starting a new one, on the US-Saudi relationship. Summary: we got troubles. Big news, eh? Interesting fact I didn't know: Prince Bandar is the only Ambassador in Washington with his own permanent State Department protective detail.
...granted to him because of "threats" and his status as a prince, according to a State Department spokesman.
The stuff about the exchange of letters between Abdullah and Bush, however, seems extremely meaningful.
So "the happiest man in the world that night, on Monday night, was Bandar bin Sultan. I was in the [indoor] swimming pool [of the McLean residence], smoking a cigar. I gave myself a day off because I worked the whole weekend. I had been to Saudi Arabia . . . out with the [Bush] response, back with our response. I worked on the weekend up to 3 o'clock, 4 o'clock in the morning. . . . I worked all Monday. And I said to my office, Tuesday I'm taking the day off."
FOREIGN AFFAIRS ALSO PUBLISHES LOTS of banal, obvious crap, by the way, I should mention. Like this article by Martin Indyk, our sometime ambassador to the region and Great Expert. Don't bother to read the considerable verbiage he expends. I shall summarize it in the two sentences it takes: a) the US government focused, after the victory in the Gulf in 1991, on promoting Israeli-Arab peace, via the Madrid conference and later measures, over democratization of our Arab allies; this didn't work out as well as hoped; b) we now need to get our Arab allies to crack down on their anti-Americanism and anti-Israeli-ism, and, yet, open up to more democracy, but while remaining stable.
Deep, huh? And how they're supposed to do this simultaneously, well, Indyk pretty much doesn't say. I think he hopes that if we all think very hard about Tinkerbell, she'll get better.
PALESTINIANS DIVIDED. I read this great article in Foreign Affairs on Friday (I suspect I was one of the few teenagers who eagerly amassed, and read, a collection of back issues), and was making notes in my head yesterday as to what to blog about it.
Then I smacked myself on the same head, and thought "wait, isn't this the article that...?" Yep, it was the one that darned Thomas Nephew had blogged about last week. The piece is by Khalil Shikaki, who did the poll we both wrote about.
It does a superb job of explaining the tensions between the Palestinian old guard, young guard, and Islamic militants, and who benefits under which likely scenario. I highly recommend the article as a must-read to understand the present Palestinian situation, and also understand why just "making Arafat irrelevant" will likely have unpleasant unintended consequences.
CHICKEN!: no, not war news. Good news. For American non-vegetarians, that is.
The poultry industry has quietly begun to bow to the demands of public health and consumer groups by greatly reducing the antibiotics that are fed to healthy chickens. [...] Three companies — Tyson Foods, Perdue Farms and Foster Farms, which produce a third of the chicken consumed by Americans each year — say they have voluntarily taken most or all of the antibiotics out of what they feed healthy chickens. In addition, the industry is turning away from an antibiotic used to treat sick birds because it is related to Cipro, the drug used to treat anthrax in humans. Some corporate consumers, including McDonald's, Wendy's and Popeye's, are now refusing to buy chicken that has been treated with it.
Marian Burros also notes that there is no monitoring and no regulation, and no way to tell if the companies are telling the truth.
PEACE PLANS: Um, guys? Jim Henley, Charles Johnson, Thomas Nephew? I have the utmost respect for all three of you gentleman, but you're getting seriously confused about a non-trivial point. Y'all keep referring to the "Barak Plan." But it wasn't the "Barak Plan." It was the Clinton Plan. The Barak government, after much squirming, gave a qualified "yes" to it as a basis for further negotiation. The Palestinian side, after much squirming, didn't respond "yes," and didn't respond with an alternative. But even on the Israeli side, there wasn't yet an "offer," per se, but a willingness to work with Clinton's outline. The Palestinians, on the other hand, felt their interests weren't being taken seriously, and I think their error, both strategic and tactical, was to not make a specific counter-offer. Referring to a "Barak Plan," that was "turned down" by the Palestinians, however, is a severe distortion of what I'm given to understand happened, and believing in this misunderstanding is apt to lead to further misunderstanding of the situation.
Have y'all read this piece by Avishai Margalit, but most importantly, Camp David: The Tragedy of Errors by Hussein Agha and Robert Malley, and the responses by Dennis Ross and Gidi Grinstein? I trust so, as they're must-reads. Settling Scores by Avishai Margalit is also immensely useful in understanding the settlements in a non-superficial way.
UNQUALIFIED OFFERINGS: Patrick mentioned to me in e-mail how highly he thought of Jim Henley's blog; I could see why immediately, including this piece on dealing with Iran that puts forth my present opinion better than I could. (Also, in the long ago days in the mid-Eighties when I was not-quite the junior-most cog on the Avon Books editorial staff, I very much wanted us to buy David Ignatius's Agents of Influence, but I ended up not being able to persuade the powers-that-were to go high enough on the auction, or something.). Excellent blog.
Also, I had no idea til now that Erik Olson, whom I know from skiffy fandom, has a (not-too-active) blog. Yo, Laurel!
ZINE HISTORY: I'd not run across this page before, which has some articles, including some recently added, on the history of "zines," at least some of which accurately refer to the lineage from science fiction (that's "sf," not "sci-fi," he said pedantically) fanzines, although the first article by Mike Gunderloy -- who does know better, and whom I've sat on panels on fanzine history with at sf conventions, where I confirmed that, cough, I knew a hell of a lot more history of sf fanzines than he does, geek, geek, ack) -- glosses extremely lightly on it, not even mentioning, say, that The Comet was done by Ray Palmer, later editor of various sf magazines, in which Palmer tended to promote the Shaver Mystery, and from whom the 1960's version of the comic book character The Atom got his civilian name, from Julie Schwartz, eofan and comic book editor. But see the superb resources at fanac.org if you'd like to know more.
(Gee, Don Markstein has a major page; small world, but no surprise; he incorrectly buys Julie's claim to have published a zine before Ray Palmer; wrong.)
Heath Row's article, the second, actually takes Frederic Wertham seriously as a source, which is hilarious, considering how poorly Wertham understood fandom in both his book, World of Fanzines and in his enthusiastic letters to sf fanzines in the Seventies. (Wertham, of course, is the man more responsible than anyone else for the McCarthyite "comic books scare" of the Fifties that resulted in the Comics Book Code, but, oddly, in the Seventies discovered sf fanzines and fell in love with the milieu, which is an ancestor of the milieu of first Usenet and now blogging.)
Don Fitch, of course, knows what he's talking about.
TALK DIRTY TO ME SOME MORE. My personal theory is that North Korea was included in the "axis of evil" because the North Koreans have been comparatively moderate in their language of late. They've always had the best rhetoric:
That war — waged by the Transitional National Government, which has its headquarters in Mogadishu, and the Somali Restoration and Reconciliation Council, based in Baidoa — comes to a crux here in Jameao, a town of grass huts occupied by troops so poor that they bring their own AK-47's and buy bullets a handful at a time.
Jameao sits astride a road, a major artery to the coast, that symbolizes Somalia's paralysis. Six days a week, the road is closed. On Mondays, both sides dig up their mines to let a food convoy pass, and charge it steep tolls.
[...]
For now, the Restoration Council may be even more cash-strapped than the new government. After agreeing to let a reporter tour the Jameao front with two Baidoa-based generals, a representative quietly asked if a car could be hired for them.
EU officials concede that the US and Europe could now be on a collision course over Iran, with the EU determined to forge a trade and cooperation agreement with Tehran just as Washington has deemed it an "evil" sponsor of terror.
I'd agree that the situation vis a vis Iran is a complex one, and it's crucial to consider the dangers in giving ammunition for the conservative mullahs to use to strengthen their hold on power over the popular democratic government of Khatami which otherwise holds little real power. But I'm also tempted to wax sarcastic about how perhaps the EU can "cooperate" with Iran in sending rockets to Arafat to kill Jews with. Yeah, well, Israel is an evil oppressor, as the EU knows, so why object to cooperation over a little matter like that? Besides, there's euro to be made.
[...] In the interview the former Conservative party chairman delivers a devastatingly comprehensive critique of US strategy. He upbraids Washington for showing much more interest in stamping out terrorism than in tackling terror's root causes.
"When you're addressing that agenda, frankly, smart bombs have their place but smart development assistance seems to me even more significant," he said.
I'm all for development assistance. But this continues to put forward the inane view that terror is "rooted" in lack of money, when, in fact, aside from the minor fact that the terrorists are personally generally from the middle and upper classes, more to the point is that absent democratic institutions of justice in poor nations, money poured into poor nations won't contribute to "development," but merely, at best, to subsistence, and more than anything to further corruption amongst the upper class.
Mind, I'm all for assistance to NGO organizations that genuinely provide help to people and institutions in poor countries, but this really is a pretty separate issue from fighting terrorism, and the notion that it isn't, that terrorism is primarily about insufficient aid is deeply, if not hopelessly, confused. Is anyone in al Queda going to lay down arms if, say, the US suddenly announced it was going to spend $50 billion dollars on development aid? Which I do think would be an excellent idea, by the way.
That view is widely held in Europe, typified by Mr Blair's much-quoted "heal the world" speech last year in Brighton.
SCIENTOLOGY STILL LED BY POND-SCUM: The St.Peterburg Times of Florida, which has some experience with Scientology, and how they sometimes simply kill people, calls our attention to this:
Scientology reaches out to troubled with ad campaign
Billboards are going up in major U.S. cities claiming to have an answer for those in distress.
[...]
For Americans troubled by economic uncertainty, fear and grief, 1,100 Church of Scientology billboards going up in major U.S. cities claim to have an answer.
"No matter how bad it is ... SOMETHING CAN BE DONE ABOUT IT."
The billboards are part of an unprecedented national media campaign by Scientology to reach what it calls "a nation still troubled by the Sept. 11 attacks."
1. Most outrageous: assoline (44) methane used as fuel. Other candidates: burka blue (11) the color of the head-to-toe garment worn by some Afghan women. Preliminary vote assoline (23), burka blue (15), Osamaniac (10) woman sexually attracted to Osama bin Laden, cuddle puddle (3) pile of Ecstasy users on the floor.
2. Most euphemistic: daisy cutter (45) large bomb that explodes a few feet above the ground. Others: women of cover (9) Bushism for Muslim women who wear traditional dress, sneakers-up (1) a dot-com that goes belly-up.
3. Most likely to succeed: 9-11 (50). Others: weaponize (10) adapt anthrax, shoes, etc. for use as a weapon, ground zero (5) site of the collapsed World Trade Center towers, pop-under (3) Internet ad appearing under the main browser window.
4. Most useful (tie): facial profiling (29) scanning video faceprints to identify terrorists and criminals, and second-hand speech (28) cell phone conversations heard by others in public places. Others in preliminary votes: linguistic profiling (15) using language clues to identify a person's ethnicity and other characteristics, theoterrorism (9), weapons-grade (4) potent as in weapons-grade salsa, annoyicon (3) logo in bottom corner of a TV screen, overconnectedness (3) being connected everywhere all the time, debris surge or debris storm (1) spread of debris from a collapsing building, to table (1) to staff an informational table.
5. Most creative: shuicide bomber (26) terrorist with bomb in shoes. Others: orthorexia nervosa (11) obsession with eating the right foods, second-hand speech (8), so September 10 (5) petty or oblivious to possible danger, Netwallah (3) website administrator, assoline (1).
6. Most unnecessary: impeachment nostalgia (27) longing for the superficial news of the Clinton era. Others: the terrorists will have already won if— (15), E.C. (15) emotionally correct as in properly responding to tragedy. Preliminary vote desk rage (2) tantrum in the office.
7. Least likely to succeed: Osamaniac (50). Others: dot-orging (4) changing employment from a dot-com to a nonprofit dot-org, interruptible (0) an energy customer allowing interruption of service for a lower rate.
There was one additional special category this year:
8. Most inspirational: Let's roll! (unanimous) the words of Todd Beamer on United Flight 93 before the attack that foiled the hijackers on September 11, words later repeated by President Bush and put into a song by Neil Young.
Nominations for what words or usages they missed? My own note is that "daisy-cutter" is not a new word of 2001, and that it is less "euphemistic" than intentionally ironic. And am I the only one who is deeply inspired and moved by the courage of those on Flight 93, but not by "let's roll"?
2/10/2002 07:20:00 AM |permanent link| | Main Page |
Other blogs commenting on this post
0 comments
ECONOMIC SENTIMENTS: ADAM SMITH, CONDORCET, AND THE ENLIGHTENMENT is a book by Emma Rothschild, Harvard University Press, 353 pp., $45.00 discussed by Alan Ryan in the NY Review of Books, July 5, 2001 issue, and I was fascinated, and made desirous of reading the book. It's a meaty enough piece that I'd be hard put to discuss it without running on at excess length, as is the problem with most good NY Review of Books pieces, and most substantial articles in general.
Whoops, I actually had downloaded the piece some time ago, having saved it to disk, and now I see that the URL has been moved into their "available only to subscribers" section. Crap. All I can say is look for the piece if you subscribe, or run across the hardcopy. It told me, at least, interesting things I did not know about Adam Smith, Jeremy Bentham, the Marquise de Condorcet, Jacques Turgot, and all manner of interesting thinking, including, for instance, the meaning of "vexatiousness."
It was the "vexatiousness" of bureaucratic regulation that both Smith and Condorcet complained of; but to say that one might be "vexed" by bureaucrats considerably understates what they had in mind. "Vexation," Rothschild writes,
is the sort of oppression which flourishes in the circumstances of an uncertain jurisprudence, in which men use the power of their offices to pursue their personal grievances. It is the oppression in which one's oppressor knows one's name, and one's weaknesses, and where one lives.
The argument for freedom in the grain trade was thus political in a very simple sense, and it illuminates Smith's claim that his Wealth of Nations was "a very violent assault" upon the commercial system of eighteenth-century Britain.
Another quote:
It is, also, exactly what Condorcet and Smith did not think. For them, it is justice toward the poor that demands that their welfare take priority over all else; it is not the principle of the greatest happiness for the greatest number. Nor is this because they did not understand what was at issue; they both thought that it was the task of government to secure justice, and that within the limits of just, predictable, minimally obstructive laws, individuals must then make what they could of their own lives in their own way. Both deplored enthusiasts for systems, the sort of men who treated their fellow creatures as sheep to be organized into a docile happiness.
A reminder of just how repressive the British and Scottish ruling class were against wrongthink in the 18th century (something I've found myself doing considerable reading on in the last couple of years):
The Scottish courts outdid the English in the savagery with which they repressed what they decided was sedition in the early 1790s. Emma Rothschild describes the cases of Thomas Muir, Thomas Palmer, William Skirving, and Maurice Margarot, who were sentenced to "transportation" to penal colonies for fourteen, seven, fourteen, and fourteen years respectively, on the strength of little more than Smithian views about the benefits of free trade and lower taxes, and the good sense of regarding our neighbors—that is, for the British, the French—as commercial partners rather than natural enemies in war. Sadly she omits the response of Lord Braxfield, who sat in these cases, to a subsequent defendant, Joseph Gerrald. When Gerald observed that Christ, too, had been a social reformer, Braxfield joked to his fellow judges, "Muckle he made o'that; he was hanget."
This judicial terrorism was not simply an attempt to frighten the artisan classes. Muir was a lawyer and Palmer a minister; transportation was intended to be a death sentence so far as men of their class were concerned. Anyone who suggested that the principles of government and the reform of institutions might be matters for public discussion was a target.
There's much more here, including
... the question... of the moment when the cleavage between economics and politics finally becomes established. For her, the telling event was the publication of Mill's essay "On the Definition of Political Economy; and on the Method of Philosophical Investigation in that Science," in The London and Westminister Review of October 1836. There, Mill characterizes economics as having the qualities of geometry: just as geometry ignores the drawing errors of children drawing triangles, the color of the paper on which they draw, and everything else other than the narrowly geometrical properties of the objects at hand, so economics leaves aside everything except the desire for wealth and the aversion people have to effort and self-denial. Political economy is then defined as "the science which traces the laws of such of the phenomena of society as arise from the combined operations of mankind for the production of wealth, in so far as those phenomena are not modified by the pursuit of any other object."
For Economic Sentiments, what is important in this account is its tidiness; economics is split off to one side, and its concerns differentiated from those of ethics, political science, aesthetics, and much else. Emma Rothschild borrows the famous image from Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations in which Wittgenstein compares the growth of science to the expansion of a city, where the chaotic jumble of the inner city gives way to the tidy rectangularity of the suburbs. In that sense, Mill's formulation marks the end of the process with which Economic Sentiments is concerned. Mill has created the intellectual box into which The Wealth of Nations is to be put, and its placement there badly distorts its political value.
But to the reader of Mill, his essay looks much more like the beginning of another process. On the one hand, it is the first blow in the long campaign— one that continues to the present— against the imperialist ambitions of economic reasoning. By emphasizing all the things that economists have to leave out in order to obtain the intellectual tidiness they aspire to, Mill warns us against accepting their advice. We would not let a professor of geometry dictate our purchases of a painting or sculpture; and in spite of Gary Becker's Nobel Prize– winning attempts to apply rational choice analysis to family life, we would not generally ask an economist's advice about whom to marry. As for Mill himself, no sooner had he tidied up his reader's ideas about economics than he set out to write his own version of The Wealth of Nations. Mill's own allegiances were broad and open to a variety of human experience in just the way that Smith's were.
The bearing of these thoughts on the argument of Economic Sentiments is indirect. On the one hand, they suggest that Emma Rothschild's account of what happened to Smith's reputation may be a little too cut and dried. The implications of assigning The Wealth of Nations to "economics" may be more contestable, and not such a clear-cut victory for a conservative interpretation of the work and its author than she suggests. On the other, it may be that even two and a quarter centuries later, what we do with books like Smith's is less constrained by what our predecessors have done than we sometimes think. Indeed, that must be true, since otherwise we could hardly learn from them as she wishes us to do.
THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO BIN LADEN is by Reuel Marc Gerecht, former CIA officer, who has yet to write a piece that isn't must-read. I did some similar analysis in mass e-mails I was writing in September, but unsurprisingly his is better. One interesting point to stress is why those who think al Qaeda wouldn't ally with an irreligious Saddam Hussein or Iran's Shi'ite clerics, or think that bin Laden will focus on a revolution in Saudi Arabia are wrong.
2/10/2002 05:05:00 AM |permanent link| | Main Page |
Other blogs commenting on this post
0 comments
THE CLUETRAIN MANIFESTO: I'd not read it before, or even heard of it, despite it being posted in 1999. I'm just out of it, I guess. It's snotty, which is more or less a requirement for manifestos, I guess, and it doesn't precisely have universal applicability in all its particulars. Still, I mostly liked it, and wonder in just how many companies it has circulated. If you're part of one, how would it apply to yours?
2/10/2002 04:20:00 AM |permanent link| | Main Page |
Other blogs commenting on this post
0 comments
HAL IS WRITING NEWS. The Columbia Newsblaster, anyway. At least he has less happy talk than tv "journalists."
Still an experimental prototype, the Columbia Newsblaster is available to anyone interested in checking it out online. Newsblaster currently looks at news reports from thirteen sources, including Yahoo, ABCNews, CNN, Reuters, Los Angeles Times, CBS News, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Virtual New York, Washington Post, Wired, and USA Today.
WHAT WENT WRONG is not only the title of Bernard Lewis's book, but a must-read piece in the January issue of The Atlantic.
For the oppressive but ineffectual governments that rule much of the Middle East, finding targets to blame serves a useful, indeed an essential, purpose—to explain the poverty that they have failed to alleviate and to justify the tyranny that they have introduced. They seek to deflect the mounting anger of their unhappy subjects toward other, outside targets.
INSUFFICIENTLY RELIGIOUS SODA POP CANS: The very fine Ginger Stampley points out that the insane folk at the American Family Association are being as bonkers as ever, this time over... wait for it... Dr. Pepper cans.
I pledge allegiance to the can of the soft drink of my choice, and to the high fructose corn syrup for which it stands, one carbonated beverage, under corporation, with caffeine and the shakes for all.
Oh, but Ginger, in your previous piece, when you said
The next couple of years will be very interesting in terms of ethnic politics -- and if you live in Houston, ethnic politics are just below the surface all the time.
First, I must solicit your strictest confidence in this transaction; this is by virtue of its nature as being utterly confidential and top secret.
You have less than my utmost promise.
I am Mr. Bimbo Daramola, Director of Projects Management in the Federal Ministry of Water Resources. My department is charged with the duties of implementation, execution and monitoring of all water related projects in the country.
Are you the guy I have to pay off to get my shower upgraded to high-pressure?
I came to know of your name and in my search for a reliable and low-key person to handle a very confidential transaction based on unflinching trust, as we have not met before.
My fame for being reliable and low-key has spread even to Nigeria. Huzzah.
This transaction involves the transfer of huge sum of foreign exchange (United States Dollars) to a foreign account. In the 2000 financial year, the Federal Government of Nigeria allocated the sum of US$458 million to my department as budgetary allocation.
That should buy quite a lot of water projects.
Within the year various multinational corporations executed series of contracts and all these contacts were duly paid for. But in all we were not able to exhaust our budgetary allocation.
If only you had contracted with Enron! By the way, you need to update this spam by a year.
There are still some excess funds left. My colleagues and I have decided to keep this excess amount for ourselves.
What the hell. Why not?
If the money is returned to government treasury my department's future allocation will be reduced or worse still, the money will be embezzled by officials of our apex bank (Central Bank of Nigeria).
Oh, no! That would be terrible! We must prevent their embezzling it by our embezzling it. Thus shall wrong be made right.
This money is currently lying
We call this a "Freudian slip."
in a suspense account in the Central Bank of Nigeria. As civil servants we are prohibited by the Code of Conduct Bureau (Civil Service Laws) from opening or operating foreign account and or dealing in foreign exchange in our names, so we cannot directly acquire the money.
Of course. You are meticulous in following rules, and thus must obey the Code of Conduct, which allows for embezzlement of hundreds of millions of dollars (Section 2012, subsection 573b, paragraph 46n, footnote 28), but not opening foreign bank accounts. Makes perfect sense.
I have therefore been mandated as a matter of trust
You having proven to be such a trustworthy guy, and trust being such a matter of personal honor for you.
by my colleagues to look for an overseas partner to whom we could transfer the excess amount to.Consequently, my colleagues and I are willing to transfer the total amount to your nominated bank account as payment for consultancy services rendered to my department for subsequent disbursement. In return we have agreed to offer you 30% of the transferred sum,
You are one generous Bimbo, dude.
while 10% shall be set aside for incidental expenses (internal and external) accrued between the parties in the course of the transaction
$46 million dollars for expenses. Dude, you need to get a cheaper ISP. If your overhead is this high, you need to hire a Consultant On Embezzlement.
and 60% for us. Our share will be used to purchase equipment and heavy machinery from your country for importation back to my country, as we cannot repatriate the physical cash back to Nigeria.
While we're doing heavy crimes, my suggestion is that heroin is far more portable, and appreciates far better. No, wait, sorry, that would be going in the wrong direction, wouldn't it? Look, I have a better idea. I have these derivatives that will give you a 300% return. I swear. I know you trust me, so just authorize me to invest the full amount for you, okay? Remember, we have unflinching trust between us.
All logistics are in place and all modalities worked out for the smooth conclusion of the transaction within ten to fourteen days of commencement. It is imperative to bear in mind that having put 29 years in service of the government, I am averse to having my image dented. This matter should therefore be treated with utmost secrecy and urgency. Kindly expedite action by contacting me and indicating your interest in this transaction in order for me to give you full details. Please I am urgently waiting your response. Regards, Bimbo Daramola
As a special Amygdala bonus to our readers you may write him at bimbod40@libanismail.com, and make him your own offer. Remember, I get 10%! Oh, drat, I blew the utmost secrecy, and strictest confidence. But as Bimbo knows I am such a reliable and low-key person, I'm sure he won't mind. With luck, he'll tell more of his friends about me, and I'll get to make even more deals! Yay. I shall soon be the premier Nigerian embezzlement management solution.
2/10/2002 01:58:00 AM |permanent link| | Main Page |
Other blogs commenting on this post
0 comments
OPEN SOURCE MILITARY INTELLIGENCE: piece from Marine Corps Gazette, October 1995 advocating use of it.
The winner in global competition today is one who can cycle information faster than the opposition. It is more than just having information; it is a matter of using it faster and better than the other person. Unfortunately our military is ill suited for the Open Source Information game. It takes both unclassified open source resources and classified intelligence to win in today's information age.
A major hurdle facing the Marine Corps is how to acquire, use, and exploit Open Source Information found along the information superhighway. We need to demystify and de-spook some of our intelligence. Military writer, John Schmitt, notes we have an intelligence "Tower of Babel" firmly cemented in place, shored up with an abundance of classification, and compartmentalized restrictions. It is difficult, if not impossible at times, to share information because of its classification. The cloak-and-dagger aspects have overwhelmed the fundamental purpose of exploiting information. Rather than use information and intelligence, we horde it.
On the other hand using open source resources has an interesting aspect. Open Source Information frequently appears less valuable than classified information because it does not carry the classification mystique. Because it appears less valuable, it is shared more freely and used more. The irony is by sharing it more the information's value and usefulness increases. When information is shared by a wider range organizations and people, the information's value in contributing a desired outcome becomes self-evident.
See 
