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November 27, 2003

The Pilgripundit

 by Jeremy

I vaguely recall there having been some discussion in the blogosphere as to who should be thought of as the first blogger (assuming we mean ?in spirit?). Now that it?s Thanksgiving -- but not only because it?s Thanksgiving -- I?d like to declare the first American blogger to be William Bradford. If you haven?t read his journal ?Of Plymouth Plantation: 1620-1647? then you?re missing out on a good read. These pilgrims strike me as having been a rather decent group of people, and some of their basic values (which I?d spend more time researching and expounding, if I did not have to get traveling) are pretty important building blocks for much of what is good about The U.S. (Though they were sometimes referred to as ?Puritans? they were by no means the evil brand of Puritans who were to follow a bit later). Check out the Mayflower Compact (or more specifically, check out the manner and spirit in which it was conceived in the first place). You get an interesting picture of the work ethic too (before the other, twisted Puritans came on the scene and perverted that and everything else into something ugly).

Anyway, Bradford was there blogging the whole experiment. (Will students of the future one day read the blogs of Salam Pax, Zeyad, Alaa, and others in the same way we read Bradford?)

Oh, but you?re asking ?does merely having kept a journal make Bradford a blogger, even in spirit?? No, not that alone. But it was more than just a captain?s log sort of thing. Consider the following: a ship of fortune seeking adventurers sailed to Plymouth to see what juicy prospects might be waiting for them. But it didn?t take long for them to see that Plymouth was not some kind of orgy of social mobility -- it was all about spiritual idealism, hard work, building relationships with the Indians, scraping by through hard winters, enduring life-threatening hardships (or not enduring them), and that kind of stuff. The adventurers ended up leaving disappointed. And they sent a laundry list of complaints back on the next ship to Plymouth. (I was amazed, by the way, at the number of ships that actually sailed back and forth across the Atlantic in the early 17th century: it was frigging Grand Central Station. In space travel terms, they must have been something like 30 years ahead of where we are now).

Anyway, here?s my favorite excerpt of Bradford?s fisking of that list of complaints:

Objection: ?The people are much annoyed with mosquitoes.?

Bradford: ?They are too delicate and unfit to begin new plantations and colonies, that cannot endure the biting of a mosquito. We would wish such to keep at home until at least they become mosquito proof.?

But, as the Pilgripundit would say: ?read the whole thing.?

And have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Posted by Jeremy at 02:05 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 26, 2003

Who's Naked Now?

 by Cara

The British Political Cartoon Society has bestowed their most intellectual and most prestigious first prize award, for their much awaited annual competition, upon Dave Brown for his cartoon picturing a naked Ariel Sharon eating a baby. Right-y-o! (hat tip: Instapundit)

Here's the comment I left on their message board as well as a direct e-mail to them:

I am in shock and beyond words at this double abomination, the cartoon and the "award", but will try to look the 'root causes' of this beast, the degradation and disintegration into oblivion of the "intellectual left", in the eye anyway.

Your blatant anti-Semitism is a wonder to behold; I hear Hitler laughing from Hell. The unmitigated gall of Dave Brown boastfully thanking Israel for their condemnation in his acceptance speech for this "award" while synagogues, Jewish schools, and holocaust museums burn around the globe is something I'm sure you can all take pride in knowing how you've done your small part to...to what exactly?

Yes, it is possible to criticize Israel's policies without descending into violent depravity but Dave Brown was proud not to even try; and you arrogantly reward him for this! This is yet another astonishing piece of filth spotlighting that, despite the 'enlightenment', Europe is still a very dark place.

And I would also like to add a hardy 'congradulations' to herr Dave and company for their faithful command of that famous "German sense of humour", and for strutting before the world in the true colors of their own Emporer's New Clothing line.

- Cara

Posted by Cara at 04:39 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

November 25, 2003

Stop the Presses: I think I Get That B.C. Cartoon!

 by Jeremy

...and I don't think it's an act of anti-Islamic hate speech (that's not the revelation yet). Patrick Lasswell once aptly pointed out (it's in his comment) that I have a grander than normal acumen for things digestion related. He's right, and I can't help but feel a certain responsibility is attendant upon such a faculty. So here's my interpretation:

The guy is walking up to the outhouse (outhouses do tend to have crescent moon cutouts in their doors and one can imagine a shrugging urge toward symmetry as having given rise to the crescent moon in the sky). The artist wishes to convey, however, that this is no ordinary outhouse visit. No, this is a bit of an emergency. Given the directoral choice of the sustained long-shot, little could be conveyed in the man's facial expression; so what better way to suggest intestinal urgency than by means of an onomatopoeic "Slam!"

The interpretation of the last frame is best left to accomplished gut analysts such as myself:
Uttering the phrase "Is it just me, or does it stink in here?" is a common preemptive evasion meant to suggest that the malodor was dealt by someone in one of the other stalls, rather than by oneself. Thus it would be humorously ironic in the extreme were one to play this gambit in the middle of the unpeopled night, while sitting alone in an outhouse.

So there you have it: it's rabid ant-acidism (and anti-gas).

-Jeremy

Posted by Jeremy at 11:51 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

"Why the Hypocrisy?"

 by Cara

Another Iraqi blogger?s reaction to the London ?peace? protests that bears repeating; Zeyad, of Healing Iraq, wrote:

?I was ashamed and depressed watching those brainwashed and deluded demonstrators in London carrying signs calling for abandoning Iraq and for an end to aggression. While I can understand people who hold peaceful principles against wars in general but nevertheless wish to see Iraq free and prosperous, I fail to understand the logic behind the thinking that appeasing and understanding terrorists will make this world a better place. It was all the same 'No blood for oil', 'Not in my name', 'Bush is Hitler', 'Stop the war', 'End the occupation', 'Bring the troops home' nonsense over and over again. It was almost like one of our masira's in the dark times of the previous regime. If those people truly dislike Bush they should have kept their mouths shout about other issues which they can never understand and sticked to anti-Bush slogans. The only thing that warmed my heart was watching different self-respecting people carrying banners that said 'Mr. Bush you are most welcome, this lot does not speak for me'. I ditto that and add that this lot surely does not speak for Iraqis either. I'm sure Saddam is proud of you and clapping his hands in glee watching from whatever gutter he is hiding in right now. The fact that Al-Arabiyah station decicated two whole hours covering these demonstration while not a single subtitle about the anti-terrorism crowds marching in Iraq only disgusted me the more.

I guess those demonstrators chose to ignore the hundreds of innocent Turk Muslims and Jews that were killed and maimed the last few days in Istanbul, the Italian peacekeepers in Nassiriyah, the Lebanese families in Saudi Arabia, the Iraqi police, school children, UN and Red Cross workers in Baghdad, the Iraqis that were praying in Najaf, the Spanish tourists in Casablanca, the demonstrating students in Iran, and decided to spill tears for the poor Iraqi militants, the innocent Taliban, and the peace loving leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Why the hypocrisy? Why the double standards? Someone seriously needs to teach these people the mechanisms of cause and effect. They are having it all jumbled up in their topsy-turvy view of the world. I can only say SHAME on you.?

Zeyad has also announced plans for a large anti-terrorism protest in Iraq on Wednesday December 10th,

?I found out yesterday on local tv (IMN) that the GC working together with Iraqi civil unions, provincial councils, prominent tribal leaders, clerics, and various political parties and organizations across the country are making preparations for large nationwide demonstrations condemning terrorism in Iraq on December 10th.?

This is important; I?m going to do what I can to show my support.

- Cara

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November 24, 2003

Dean, Rall...Whatever.

 by Jeremy

Glenn Reynolds' post on the Ted Rall endorsement of Dean was extremely helpful to me. I can now scratch Dean off my "haven't yet ruled out" list. His weirdly patronizing efforts to court the Dukes-of-Hazard redneck vote should probably have done it, but I tend to be too forgiving. I also had not seen Rall's "Terror Widows" cartoon from 2002. Rall, I now have no qualms about saying, is a turd.

I tried to post a diplomatically worded (ie: I neglected to note that Rall is a worthless piece of sh*t) comment on the Dean blog, but the comment would not go through. So I include it here:

I had not entirely ruled out voting for Dean, but this Dean-approved endorsement by Ted Rall has helped me see that I cannot vote for him. Rall romanticizes terrorism: he's a member of what I call the Pat Buchanan left, meaning he likes to be thought of as left wing but supports a cynical foreign policy (or lack of one) that right wing "realists" have been supporting for decades. The fact that Dean is not embarassed by this endorsement vindicates my sense that Dean's lip service to the importance of winning the peace in Iraq is disingenuous. What Dean might do to fix the health care crisis, for instance, is not worth what he'd probably do to Iraq.

If Dean wants to get votes from people like me he ought to be reading what people in Iraq are writing about their situation -- here's an example:
http://healingiraq.blogspot.com/
Zeyad, the guy who writes this blog out of Baghdad, has links to others in Iraq, some of whom are anti-war/anti-occupation (e.g. Riverbend), so there's a mix of views. Dean and followers should read these blogs carefully rather than read guys like Rall if he wants to convince people he has a sophisticated foreign policy. Though I won't vote for Dean I think all voters would benefit from a debate on Iraq that goes beyond Rall's rancid fictions.

By the way, Riverbend often pisses me off, though I also think her portraits of life in Iraq help fill the void left by the pitiful media coverage. But I'm curious what you all think about Riverbend. Please share your views in the comments.

-Jeremy

Posted by Jeremy at 12:40 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

November 21, 2003

"...it's blowin' you and me!"

 by Cara

Another breath of fresh air from the Mesopotamian, Alaa from Baghdad, knocks a "mighty wind" out of London's ?peace? sails during Bush?s visit there:

?Today, the terrorists in Istanbul answered the ?peace? demonstrators in London. Those who have eyes can see, and those who have ears can hear, but there are those whom ?God has sealed their hearts for them with a mask, so that they are deaf, dumb and blind and thus can hardly comprehend anything? (Verses to this effect recur frequently in the Holly Quran ) .

These London demonstrations, I know too well, Oh! Youth, and the Pint of Bitter later in the nearest Pub. All you peace lovers and humanitarians of trendy London town, spare a thought or two for the coalition soldier out there in the dark and wilderness guarding our hospitals, primary schools and orphanages from the bombers and assassins, and the Iraqi Police reporting everyday for duty under constant danger of death and mutilation with their poor equipment and meager $50 or so a month pay package. They number almost 100 000 by now and if enlistment is really opened up they would quadruple in number immediately. Why do you think they come? Saddamists pay anybody ten thousand dollars per explosion, and they are going around trying to recruit, and this is a fact that all people in Baghdad know. So why do they come, you think? But only those who have eyes can see, and ears can hear. Why do you think the crackle of celebratory gunfire ululated till dawn, on that sultry Baghdad summer night when the death of Uday and Qusay the monster brats of the tyrant was announced? This, the media did not dwell upon, although quite newsworthy and dramatic. That was the real Opinion Poll of the vast majority of the inhabitants of Baghdad.?

- Cara

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November 20, 2003

Beginning My Election Year Arithmetic

 by Jeremy

Bush Big Plus (I hope?):

"I said that we're going to bring our troops home starting next year?" Mr. Bush replied, in a tone that conveyed that he was committing himself to no such thing.

"We could have less troops in Iraq, we could have the same number of troops in Iraq, we could have more troops in Iraq," Mr. Bush said, adding that the number would be whatever is "necessary to secure Iraq."

Actions are what will matter the most come election time, but words and tone are not to ignored. I find this reassuring; am I wrong?

Bush Minus:

"Marriage is a sacred institution between a man and a woman. Today's decision of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court violates this important principle. I will work with Congressional leaders and others to do what is legally necessary to defend the sanctity of marriage."

I can put aside my prejudice over a president holding strong religious beliefs, but when his rhetoric plays matchmaker between church and state, my hackles get raised.

I will start in earnest on the reckoning of Democrats, though the prospect of this next year gives me a nauseous feeling (a psychosomatic one, I think, though Iwouldn't swear to it.)

UPDATE: I just have to revisit Bush's London speech to share another huge plus. I never thought we'd have a president who was this far left of center on foreign policy. If Bush is a reactionary imperialist bad guy, then I'm a little confused about what those things are supposed to mean:

"It is not realism to suppose that one-fifth of humanity is unsuited to liberty; it is pessimism and condescension, and we should have none of it.

We must shake off decades of failed policy in the Middle East. Your nation and mine, in the past, have been willing to make a bargain, to tolerate oppression for the sake of stability. Long-standing ties often led us to overlook the faults of local elites. Yet this bargain did not bring stability or make us safe. It merely bought time, while problems festered and ideologies of violence took hold.

As recent history has shown, we cannot turn a blind eye to oppression just because the oppression is not in our own backyard. No longer should we think tyranny is benign because it is temporarily convenient. Tyranny is never benign to its victims, and our great democracies should oppose tyranny wherever it is found." [read the rest...]

-Jeremy

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November 19, 2003

So Much to blog about, so little time

 by Jeremy

This has been a long week, a big week. It would figure that I don?t have time to write in much depth -- each word I write here is a kind of theft from the various people who are counting on me to finish one project and another, people I have been on the verge of childishly dodging for days. I really hope these people don?t know about this blog.

I will thus slap together some random links and random reflections:

Bush -- the speech in London:

Genuinely funny:

?It was pointed out to me that the last noted American to visit London stayed in a glass box dangling over the Thames. A few might have been happy to provide similar arrangements for me! I thank Her Majesty the Queen for interceding. We're honored to be staying at her house...?

In case you forgot that some define the U.S. as not only a religious state, but a specifically Christian, and precisely Protestant one:

?It's rightly said that Americans are a religious people. That's in part because the "Good News" was translated by Tyndale, preached by Wesley, lived out in the example of William Booth?

Right on, Brother! (I mean that sincerely):

"There are principled objections to the use of force in every generation, and I credit the good motives behind these views. Those in authority, however, are not judged only by good motivations. The people have given us the duty to defend them, and that duty sometimes requires the violent restraint of violent men. In some cases, the measured use of force is all that protects us from a chaotic world...Most in the peaceful West have no living memory of that kind of world. Yet in some countries, the memories are recent.

The victims of ethnic cleansing in the Balkans, those who survived the rapists and the death squads, had few qualms when NATO applied force to help end those crimes. The women of Afghanistan, imprisoned in their homes and beaten in the streets, and executed in public spectacles, did not reproach us for routing the Taliban. The inhabitants of Iraq's Baathist hell, with its lavish palaces and its torture chambers, with its massive statues and its mass graves, do not miss their fugitive dictator; they rejoiced at his fall.

"...Europe's peaceful unity is one of the great achievements of the last half-century, and because European countries now resolve differences through negotiation and consensus, there's sometimes an assumption that the entire world functions in the same way.
But let us never forget how Europe's unity was achieved: by Allied armies of liberation and NATO armies of defense...? [more...]

Proud to be a Resident of Massachusetts

The Supreme Court of Massachusetts rules that a ban on same sex marriage is a violation of the state?s constitution. It doesn?t take much vision to see that this is a huge win for people, like me, who think same sex marriage will be progress for human rights. Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney complains that marriage has been between a man and a woman for three thousand years (where does that number come from? I?m honestly curious). Thurgood Marshall once pointed out, as a response to advocates of gradualism in civil rights reform, that four hundred years is nothing if not gradual. I?d argue that three thousand years is long enough to be called a fairly conservative arc of progress as well. There will always be those who are late in waking up to the fact that the future is calling, but I?m proud to live in a state that, at least this once, got there first.

It?s too bad for gay people that they carry multiple burdens: they not only have to work out their own identity issues, but they?re put in a position of having to deliver the news to the heterosexual culture that we need to come to terms with our own hang-ups as well: if love and sex have meanings that transcend the commandment to be fruitful and multiply, then we?ve got some head scratching to do (have you really though as much about this as you think you have? Well good, but you're probably exceptional). I?m sure that the majority of gay people would rather just live their lives in peace, married if they so choose, and not be perceived as activists or iconoclasts. Indeed the gay couples that Cara and I know have lives that are every bit as damned prosaic --and damned beautiful -- as ours, and now it?s possible to imagine a time when they will bore people to tears with photos of their weddings.

More thoughts on other important stories tomorrow...

-Jeremy

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November 18, 2003

Re-examining Stockholm Syndrome

 by Cara

Given that today is 25th anniversary of the Jonestown massacre (see Jeff Jarvis for a great piece on this), I thought it would be appropriate to dust off this little meditation, one I?d meant to post a week or so ago but got distracted by Ted Rall?s ?Irony?, on the relevance of re-examining the psychological phenomenon that is Stockholme Syndrome.

?In 1973, four Swedes held in a bank vault for six days during a robbery became attached to their captors, a phenomenon dubbed the Stockholm Syndrome. According to psychologists, the abused bond to their abusers as a means to endure violence. Long-term psychological study of this and similar hostage situations has defined a fairly clear and characteristic set of symptoms for the Stockholm Syndrome:

The captives begin to identify with their captors. At least at first this is a defensive mechanism, based on the (often unconscious) idea that the captor will not hurt the captive if he is cooperative and even positively supportive. The captive seeks to win the favor of the captor in an almost childlike way.

The captive often realizes that action taken by his would-be rescuers is very likely to hurt him instead of obtaining his release. Attempts at rescue may turn a presently tolerable situation into a lethal one. If the bullets of the authorities don't get him, quite possibly those of the provoked captor will.

Long term captivity builds even stronger attachment to the captor as he becomes known as a human being with his own problems and aspirations. Particularly in political or ideological situations, longer captivity also allows the captive to become familiar with the captor's point of view and the history of his grievances against authority. He may come to believe that the captor's position is just.

The captive seeks to distance himself emotionally from the situation by denial that it is actually taking place. He fancies that "it is all a dream", or looses himself in excessive periods of sleep, or in delusions of being magically rescued. He may try to forget the situation by engaging in useless but time consuming "busy work". Depending on his degree of identification with the captor he may deny that the captor is at fault, holding that the would-be rescuers and their insistence on punishing the captor are really to blame for his situation.? -The Peace Encyclopedia

After listening to Jessica Stern on C-SPAN discuss at length her terrorism theories I connected two things that I strangely hadn?t before. (Jessica Stern, by the way, in August, said this of the terrorist bombing of the U.N. headquarters in Iraq: ?Yesterday's bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad was the latest evidence that America has taken a country that was not a terrorist threat and turned it into one.? And Michael Totten summed up by saying that throughout her piece: ?Terrorism is blamed on America. Religious extremism is blamed on America. Sabotage is blamed on America. Every problem is blamed on America.?) The combination of her oh so sympathetic social worker tone, her droning on and on about how we?ve (the west/U.S.) ?humiliated? the Arab world, and her referencing the many interviews she?s done over the years, with self-avowed terrorists of many ethnicities and religions, acknowledging a large amount of time she?d spent talking with these terrorists getting ?their side? of things all suddenly collided to remind me of Patty Hearst. Has anyone written about this before, the response of the post-9/11 frenzied ?anti-war left?, in general, looking very much like a sort of diluted form of Stockholm Syndrome? And just what gives me the right to take the ?left?s? inventory, you may ask? Well, I don?t think anyone needs an advanced degree to see obvious similarities here.

Of course I realize that no one (regarding the west anyway) is literally being held hostage (that we know of); Stockholm Syndrome is also implicated in other situations that aren?t strictly hostage situations:

?While the psychological condition in hostage situations became known as "Stockholm Syndrome" due to the publicity -- the emotional "bonding" with captors was a familiar story in psychology. It had been recognized many years before and was found in studies of other hostage, prisoner, or abusive situations such as: Abused Children, Battered/Abused Women, Prisoners of War, Cult Members, Incest Victims, Criminal Hostage Situations, Concentration Camp Prisoners? - By Joseph M. Carver, PhD from Stockholm Syndrome: The Mystery of Loving an Abuser

But aren?t the terrorists really, besides killing all infidels, working to hold the entire world hostage? Isn?t fear and stress involved? Let?s re-examine those four characteristics listed and compare them with these four post-9/11 ?lefty? characteristics. 1) Isn?t it clear by now that ?lefties? who apologize for terrorists (however minimally) and denounce the west/U.S. are thinking that this stance will somehow protect them from attack? 2) Isn?t the ?left?s? outright hostility toward an interventionist stance, which hinges on their fear of the Arab world rising up in anger, similar to a hostage fearing a rescue attempt that may result in getting hurt instead of rescued? 3) Doesn?t the relentless immersion of attention into the famous ?root causes? of terrorism end up creating a comparable bond of sympathy with ?their side of the story?, and 4) isn?t the ?left?s? outright denial of so much of the situation more than obvious by now?

I?ve always thought that the anti-war ?left?s? response was at least partly fear based, terrorist fear based, whether they admitted it or not. I never bought their line that they really fear Bush more than the terrorists. People who really thought that Bush was the most dangerous man on the planet I suspect would not be freely shouting it out in the open if they thought for a moment they?d get shot. But this Stockholm Syndrome thing has struck many familiar chords here...Oh yeah, and there?s this; Yvonne Ridley, British journalist who snuck into Afghanistan during the war wearing a Burka, was captured and held prisoner by the Taliban for 11 days. She?s now converted to her captors? ?religion?. My nightmare scenario always culminates in the Hollywood anti-war ?left?, and its followers, selling conversion to "Islam" as ?hip?, claiming the ?enlightenment? comparable to, say, the Beatles finding the Maharishi in 1967 (oh yeah, one big difference, the Maharishi didn?t run armed militant terrorist training camps that prepare the enlightened ones for the targeted killing of innocent ?infidels?).

This is obviously a very large topic and big can of worms that I cannot possibly due justice to here. I will, however, try to keep up on all relevant new information as well as continuing to research old information. I wish there was a psychologist with an advanced degree whose objectivity I could trust enough to ask about all of this. Unfortunately, I fear that many within the ?therapeutic community?, at least many that I?ve come in contact with these days, may have fallen victim to it themselves.

- Cara

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November 17, 2003

The Courage to Protest Fascist Violence

 by Jeremy

Iraqi blogger, Zeyad, reports the following:

Huge anti-terrorism demonstrations were held in Nassiriyah yesterday by students association condemning the attacks on the Italian force carrying signs such as 'No to terrorism. Yes to freedom and peace', and 'This cowardly act will unify us'. I have to add that there were similar demonstrations in Baghdad more than a week ago also by students against the bombings of police stations early this Ramadan.

Even Zeyad had thought such protests against Baathist and Islamist scum would be too dangerous to expect Iraqis to engage in, and had thought (quite rightly) that some of his American readers' calls for such demonstrations were naive:

I hope the demonstrations advocates that bugged me are satisfied now. There are also preparations for anti-terror demonstrations before Id (end of Ramadan holidays).

Let the pleasant surprises, and the courage and determination of the Iraqi people, continue.

Also see Zeyad's review of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and his anecdote about Uday's gold plated Rolls-Royce.

This article refers to it as "metallic pink", but it looks gold enough in the picture.

-Jeremy

Posted by Jeremy at 08:29 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

November 15, 2003

Ted Rall: Why We Retch

 by Jeremy

There is a large coterie of left wing opponents of the war-in-Iraq that has gotten in the habit of choosing some rather surprising issues to get exercised about. They?ve climbed on soapboxes over stuff any self-respecting lefty would have sneered at just a few years ago: the outrage of ruining an honorable CIA agent?s career; the vital importance of respecting the sovereign borders of a fascist dictatorship; the folly of spending our hard earned tax dollars on wreckless efforts to defend third world people who don?t value democracy the way we do anyway...and numerous gradations and variations of the above.

One thing that particularly galls me about Ted Rall?s sensitive exegesis of the Iraqi ?resistance? -- his own little ?Birth of a Nation? (by the way, this strikes me as a rich vein for Rall. Some loving portraits I?d like to see him paint: We Wanted Only Freedom: the Loving Struggle of the Nicaraguan Contras; We Shoot Because We Love: An intimate Portrait of the D.C. Snipers; Why I Am a Family Man: A Portrait of Peace Activist, Charles Manson) is that we are supposed to take it as a given that Rall is leftist. I have a lot of difficulty with that. But you don?t have to take my word for it.

The Iraqi Communist Party would certainly seem to agree with people like Rall in having opposed the war, in justifying, in principle, violent opposition to an occupying army. But here?s what they have to say about the actual occupation and the actual violence against coalition forces and soft targets that is going on in Iraq:

The outcome of the war...exposed the bankruptcy of the regime and its hollow claims. Furthermore, all this revealed our people?s overwhelming desire to get rid of the regime. Thus in an unprecedented development, of enormous significance for Iraq and the region, the people chose to stand aside, watching a fight between a foreign power, which they knew only too well, and a deeply hated regime...

...The overwhelming majority of our people were overjoyed at the regime?s shameful collapse. But it did not bring about the emergence of the democratic alternative they desired. A dangerous political and security vacuum resulted, with serious political, economic and social consequences that are still with us today. Tackling this situation is a top priority at present...

...armed operations in our country?s current circumstances inflict harm on the desired aim: to get rid of the occupation as soon as possible. Such operations actually provide the pretext for the occupying forces to prolong their presence, as well as perpetuating the state of tension, concern and fear among the people. Acts of sabotage against basic services, electricity networks, gas supplies and oil pipelines only aggravate the suffering of the people. Such armed operations, including criminal acts of assassination, are exploited by remnants of the ousted regime to nurture their hopes for regaining power...

...During this transitional period, when contradictions and struggle over the future direction of development intensify, it is essential, more than ever before, to have multifarious international solidarity by the forces of peace, and progressive and democratic movements, to support and consolidate Iraqi patriotic and democratic forces in their struggle to foil attempts to sabotage the political process and push the country towards chaos and internal strife. This solidarity is also essential to enable the Iraqi people to bring about a speedy end to occupation and open up prospects for democratic development in Iraq...

I?m not jumping up and down about the Iraqi Communist Party, but if it?s a glimpse of the far left position on Iraq you?re looking for, they?re obviously where you?d want to look. So Call Ted Rall what you wish, but don?t let him convince you he?s in solidarity with the Iraqi people or with the far left.

-Jeremy

Posted by Jeremy at 01:36 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBack

November 13, 2003

'Why We Fight', Indeed!

 by Cara

Here?s a comment from a reader named Paleo in response to my earlier post on the ?Left?s? tendency these days to drift further and further into the radical fringe, taking the mainstream left along for the ride, and mirroring the sentiments of both the British ?left? (?Hitler requires, not condemnation, but understanding?, D.S.Savage) and the American Firsters of WWII: ?Finally, your attempt to equate opposition to Bush's war in Iraq with the American firsters in 1941 is ahistorical and despicable.? - Paleo

Well, I find that the ?opposition to Bush?s war in Iraq? has now gone far beyond America Firsters in ways I never would?ve imagined possible:
via Michael Totten here?s a bit of syndicated columnist Ted Rall?s Column for Veteran?s Day:

?NEW YORK--Dear Recruit:
Thank you for joining the Iraqi resistance forces. You have been issued an AK-47 rifle, rocket-propelled grenade launcher and an address where you can pick up supplies of bombs and remote-controlled mines. Please let your cell leader know if you require additional materiel for use against the Americans.
Our leaders include generals of President Saddam Hussein's secular government as well as fundamentalist Islamists. We are Sunni and Shia, Iraqi and foreign, Arab and Kurdish. Though we differ on what kind of future our country should have after liberation and many of us suffered under Saddam, we are fighting side by side because there is no dignity under the brutal and oppressive jackboot of the U.S. Coalition Provisional Authority or their Vichyite lapdogs on the Governing Council, headed by embezzler Ahmed Chalabi.

Now our only option is guerilla warfare: we must kill as many Americans as possible at a minimum risk to ourselves.?

What a charming, warm & fuzzy, anti-war peaceful thought?! I am just enamored!
What?s your excuse Ted? S-a-t-i-r-e?("In Iraq we are the bad guys") Or a blossoming love of fascism? Or maybe a bit of both?

I?m truly fascinated at this phenomenon, as was someone else once:

?But though not much interested in the ?theory? of pacifism, I am interested in the psychological processes by which pacifists who have started out with an alleged horror of violence end up with a marked tendency to be fascinated by the success and power of Nazism.? Mr. Orwell, in 1942, continued, ?Even pacifists who wouldn?t own to any such fascination are beginning to claim that a Nazi victory is desirable in itself...A few weeks back he (Alex Comfort, British lefty pacifist writer) was hoping for a Nazi victory because of the stimulating effect it would have on the arts: ?As far as I can see, no therapy short of complete military defeat has any chance of re-establishing the common stability of literature and of the man on the street.?

Another charming, warm & fuzzy, anti-war peaceful thought!!

The ?Left? has, once again, walked through the looking glass folks! Care to join them Paleo?

- Cara

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November 12, 2003

The Other Sincerest Form of Flattery

 by Jeremy

I wrote a while back of an intention to catalog the heroism of political leaders around the world who embody the kind of progressive heroism we haven?t seen so much of on the recent American scene. I swear I?m going to bring that together. One of the people on that list will be Shirin Ebadi. Is that just because she won the Nobel peace prize this year? Ok, I confess -- I hadn?t heard of her before that. The Nobel Prize is not a bad way to get the word out. It makes a good calling card; it tends to make people all over the world do a little research on your career. And it brings out the bad attention along with the good.

One legacy of heroism in the name of freedom -- the one I hope will never attach itself to Ebadi?s name -- is the tendency of such leaders? successes to attract the rancid passions of the reactionary scum who see any movement toward progress for others as a vicious attack on their own power (real or imagined).

Shirin Ebadi has been receiving death threats.

That an Iranian woman who has struggled for the rights of women and children in the country she loves would receive death threats, should not be surprising. It seems, though, that these threats have grown chillingly regular and credible.

Associates of Iranian human rights activist Shirin Ebadi say the threatening letters began arriving just days after the announcement that she had won the Nobel Peace Prize early last month. The letters, which have been coming in at the rate of one or two a day ever since, are anonymous but explicit. One is reported to have threatened: "We will not let you enjoy this prize." Unidentified persons also left torn photos of Ebadi outside her Tehran office.

* * *

The Nobel Peace Prize and its check for $1.3 million will be awarded in Oslo, Norway, on 10 December. The prize has catapulted Ebadi to world fame and has forced the Iranian government -- usually the target of her activism -- to place sufficient political value on her life to protect it. But the award also appears to be mobilizing her opponents to work ever harder to discredit her work in an effort to discourage others from emulating it.

* * *

"At Tehran Polytechnic University, she shook hands with a male professor. Consequently, he was barred from attending the university for a year. Ayatollah Montazeri issued a religious decree to make an exception [permitting the handshake under the specific circumstances]. This decree is a significant change in Shia rules," Dadkhah [a lawyer at Ebadi's Center for Protecting Human Rights] said.

Let?s hope her role as lightning rod for positive change overwhelms the onslaught from those who would shut her up. While death threats are one barometer of Ebadi?s potential to usher progress in Iran, let?s hope the real mark of her power will be seen in the surfacing courage of her admirers and imitators.

-Jeremy

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November 10, 2003

Forgotten Lessons of Kristallnacht

 by Jeremy

November 9th and 10th mark the 65th anniversary of Kristallnacht, a waking nightmare of pogroms against Jews throughout Germany and Austria in which hundreds of synagogues were burned to the ground, thousands of homes and businesses were destroyed and over over 30,000 Jews were sent to concentration camps. The attacks were carried out by civilian thugs but the horrific chaos was manufactured by the Nazi leadership in order to test what reaction there would be against the sort of horrors they were contemplating.

Elie Wiesel, speaking at the University of Buffalo several years ago, described the awful significance of this, as related in the University newspaper:

Several times he referred to the Holocaust as "entirely preventable." To make his point, he traced some of the events that preceded it, beginning with Kristallnacht in November 1938, "the night of the broken glass" when 750 synagogues and thousands of shops run by Jews in Germany were destroyed.

"How come the doors didn't open then?" he wondered. "How come people didn't say, 'You are my neighbor, come in?' Where were the 'good' people?"

Even more mystifying, he said, was the response from the rest of the world. "The story of Kristallnacht was reported on the front page of The New York Times, and probably The Buffalo News, too," he said.

But nothing was done.

Only months later, he continued, the St. Louis, a ship with more than 1,000 Jewish men, women and children-whose visas for Cuba were suddenly annulled-was turned away from the U.S. and sent back to Germany. "How was this possible in the U.S., in this greatest democracy, a country that is based on the idea that all refugees need a home somewhere?" he asked. "Was there nobody in the White House who could say, 'Okay, we can afford to take these people in?'"

Wiesel described the Munich agreement as one in which Britain and France essentially sacrificed Czechoslovakia to appease Hitler.

With each step forward, he said, Hitler was testing the world's reaction, and when there was none, he proceeded with the "Final Solution."

I?m often told that it?s unfair to raise the specter of WWII and the holocaust into discussions of the situation in Iraq. I will quite simply never understand that. Likewise I cannot think of a better way to honor the lives of the millions who died during the holocaust than to join the chorus of people who refuse to sit quietly while similar atrocities are committed in similarly remote parts of the world.

We have been told this week that the bodies 300,000 people are believed to be buried in mass graves in Iraq. I don't believe that comes close to the full number of victims of Saddam?s own holocaust. And now, as Iraq wakes up from its nightmare, I can?t think of a better way to recognize this anniversary than to ask ourselves why the world waited so long to act and why, even now, so many would prefer to look the other way.

Several days ago in the New York Times I found this:

Until justice is done and Saddam Hussein is dead, Sadri Adab Diwan will carry with him the handwritten accusation that condemned his little sister to death.

The sister, Hanaa, a high school student, "is conducting backward religious activity inside the school," a security agent wrote in black ink in October 1980, a time of widespread persecution of Shiite Muslims. "Please open a secret investigation."

Soon afterward, Hanaa, a devout girl of 17, was arrested. She never returned home.

It was only six months ago, after locating her yellowing case file in a government office, that her family finally learned why she had been taken. Hanaa, an informer reported, gave a Koran to a classmate.

"The case of this girl, this pure-hearted girl, has been living with me for 20 years," said Mr. Diwan, who was the eldest of 10 children of whom Hanaa was the youngest. "If I catch Saddam, I won't kill him. That won't be enough. I'll suck his blood. And if he escapes, I'll follow him to the ends of the earth."

The least we can do is remember, keep our eyes open...and refuse to keep quiet.

For more on Kristallnacht, see Jeff Jarvis, and read here and listen to a streaming video account by a witness.

-Jeremy

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November 08, 2003

The Revolution Will Be Blogged

 by Cara & Jeremy

This is too important. As many folks as possible should read this piece, found via Jeff Jarvis, from an Iraqi named Alaa, posting in the midst of Baghdad on a blog called The Messopotamian:

?Jolted and shocked by the events of September 11, the United States of America, the greatest and most powerful politico-economic power that humanity has ever known has realised that the advanced and rich western world can no longer ignore the plight of the poorer and underdeveloped world. Those "nation states", who have totally failed the test of self determination and self goverment, and degenerated into obscurantism, sectarianism, tribalism, and all the other isms of hell, pose a mortal danger, both to the people unfortunate to live there and to the Western civilisation itself. More so since the technical complexity of the advanced world render it particularly vulnerable. The danger is real, oh so real! Anybody doubting this is living in a fools paradise.

So Action was decided upon. Action to change the situation in this twilight zone ( c.f. George Orwel - 1984 ), action to bring the values and standards enjoyed by the prosperous world to these places, by force if necessary, by example preferably. And action was taken. this in a nutshell. Let who may tear their hair off. Let them protest until their lungs puncture and shout until their throats bleed. This is it. It is like all great movements in history, characterised by singlemindedness and overpowering impulse. The old style of european imperialism, which aimed at exploitation, cheap raw materials, and keeping people backward and in a state of peasant low existance, has gone and is no longer suitable for the world. A globalised world where every body can enjoy the freedoms and benefits taken for granted by the "advanced" world. This is liberal neo-imperialism. Is it eutopean, is it unrealisable ? I don't know the answer. But the campaign is already under way.

Years ago, in my earlier youth, had I heard somebody talking like this, my hair would have stood on end, I would have been thrown into a fit of rage enough to give me heart attack. But years of suffering, years ground to dust and wasted living under a system which had hardly anything right in it, atavism which took us back to a moral state comparable to that that existed even before the reforms of Islam fifteen centuries ago, have finally brought me to this forlorn conclusion: that perhaps it is better this way - perhaps that really, salvation lies herein.

Caution to the wind. Consider this: if the U.S. tommorrow announces that anybody willing to come to its land would be given the "Green Card" immediately with no further question, how many people do you think would stand in line? Answer this question if you dare ? Why if Western values are so bad and so terrible would you find Muslim, Hindu, Buddist, and every colour and every breed standing in that hypothetical line, in their billions ?

But America cannot take in the entire humanity, so america decides to go to them instead.?

He ends the post this way: ?Long Live the Blogging Revolution.?
This is the reality all fascists are now fighting against.

- Cara & Jeremy

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November 06, 2003

The Truth is Bitter Medicine (if it tastes sweet, check the label)

 by Jeremy

The hard truth about Iraq should not be easy to swallow, for any of us. If you were against this war, want the troops to come home now, think the whole thing was about oil and feel no moral discomfort, you?re lying to yourself. I supported this war and think American troops need to stay until Iraq is free from the imminent threat of slipping back into Baathist domination (or equally unthinkable variations on that nightmare). But this is not an opinion that makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside. Many Iraqis died during the war and American, British and other coalition soldiers and Iraqis are being attacked and killed almost daily. It?s an awful situation.

Of course, it?s the openness of our society that enables us to know that these deaths are occurring. Literally unspeakable Baathist atrocities, multiplied by the thousands, that would otherwise still have been occurring these past six months in Iraq have been halted thanks to the heroism of American and British troops and their allies. It was not long ago that events such as the one described below in a New York Times op-ed by David Brooks (via Glenn Reynolds) were an everyday occurrence. And the monsters who perpetrated them could be assured that they would not make the evening news:

Um Haydar was a 25-year-old Iraqi woman whose husband displeased Saddam Hussein's government. After he fled the country in 2000, some members of the Fedayeen Saddam grabbed her from her home and brought her out on the street. There, in front of her children and mother-in-law, two men grabbed her arms while another pulled her head back and beheaded her. Baath Party officials watched the murder, put her head in a plastic bag and took away her children.

Try to put yourself in the mind of the killer, or of the guy with the plastic bag. You are part of Saddam's vast apparatus of rape squads, torture teams and mass-grave fillers. Every time you walk down the street, people tremble in fear. Everything else in society is arbitrary, but you are absolute. When you kill, your craving for power and significance is sated. You are infused with the joy of domination.
These are the people we are still fighting in Iraq. These are the people who blow up Red Cross headquarters and U.N. buildings and fight against democracy and freedom...

Zeyad, an Iraqi dentist blogging out of Baghdad, is someone we need to be reading. He tells it like he sees it. Reading his blog ?Healing Iraq? it would be easy to forget for an hour or so that you are supposed to view this thing from an ideological perspective, from left vs. right, Democrat vs. Republican. In a long, angry post in response to some glib commenters telling him that Iraqis should be out on anti-terrorism demonstrations, it?s best to stop trying to decide whether his anger is at the facile views from the left or from the right. What?s clear is that Zeyad is pro Iraqi-freedom, as should we all be:

First, I have to explain to some western idealists that public demonstrations is an alien idea to the majority of Iraqis. We have been forced to demonstrate in favour of Saddam, the Ba'ath, Palestine, and Arab nationalism for 3 decades. Just to give you an idea on how that was like for us; party members would surround colleges, schools, and govt. offices. They block all outlets and shove people into buses which head to wherever the demonstrations are to be held. You simply cannot refuse to demonstrate. I remember hiding in the toilet back in high school whenever the buses came into the park to herd us to the demos. It wasn't a pleasant experience I can tell you. Once I got stuck and had to shout anti-imperialist slogans at one of these rallies just two years ago. You don't have the slightest idea of what it is like to live your life daily in fear.

Now today, we are facing terrorist and violent threats against our nurseries, schools, colleges, hospitals, clinics, oil pipelines, power stations, water purification systems, and other civilian facilities. If you think that a peaceful demonstration would deter those criminals from doing harm to us, then you are 100% wrong. . .

You should go read his entire blog (don?t be thrown by his well aimed anger in these excerpts -- he?s seems like a genuinely good person who nevertheless doesn?t suffer fools gladly when the future of his country hangs in the balance)

It?s impossible to select one passage as more essential than another, so here?s more:

. . .You see a handful of teenagers dancing in front of the camera celebrating dead Americans, and you judge an entire people, you start whining about pulling the troops out of Iraq and giving the Iraqis what they deserve. Are you people really so close-minded? It is the fault of your news agencies that show you what they want, its certainly not ours.

Zeyad?s blog is a resource of historical importance, so it?s upsetting the see him overwhelmed to the point of possibly chucking the whole thing.

And to the guy who was being sarcastic about me sitting in an internet cafe and blogging or playing games instead of going out and organizing a demonstration. Well maybe you are right. I'm sick of people who don't appreciate my efforts. I'm wasting many hours a day and half my salary just to maintain this blog. I have a job, patients, a family, and friends, in other words I have a life. Maybe I will at one point do as you say and diss this whole stupid blog idea.

We need to visit Healing Iraq frequently to declare, through our "pageviews," that what he?s doing is of tremendous importance.

-Jeremy

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November 04, 2003

Gastroparesis: a Public Service Announcement

 by Jeremy

Well I knew it would happen -- someone did a Google search for ?post viral gastroparesis? and clicked through to a comments thread in which I mention having this particular stomach disorder. The poor gastroparesis searcher was undoubtedly pissed off to find a page full of my ruminations (no pun intended) on world affairs and really nothing about GP. So this post is my effort to remedy the situation.

I have a relatively mild case of gastroparesis, a disorder in which peristalsis of the stomach is slowed or stopped. There is no cure for GP at present and the treatments available are often not very effective. My case is mild because I don?t vomit after I eat; I just feel queasy or get cramps, so I approach meals with slight trepidation. It?s annoying but not really a big deal. You know that feeling, when you?re facing a pint of Bud and a foot-long chili dog that you plan to chase with a triple-decker ice cream sundae? That unheeded inkling that you may later regret what you are about to do? That is how I regard my Wheaties in the morning. Having a slice of pizza is something for which I have to plan ahead, like a trip to New York. But it?s really nothing to bitch about and, frankly, it?s precisely the kind of thing you?d wish upon your worst enemy. So wish away with my blessing.

People who get Gastroparesis as a complication of diabetes, however, tend to get the severe form. Those who have it the worst simply cannot eat without vomiting and hence become anorexic and dangerously malnourished and need feeding tubes and such. This you would not wish on anyone short of Bin Laden himself (so wish away with my blessing).

I got mild GP after a violent stomach infection that caused me severe pain and extreme dehydration. I probably got it from eating out a restaurant. This happened shortly before all those cases of Norwalk Virus started popping up on cruise ships, so of course I figured that?s what I had. But I?ve since concluded, via newspaper accounts, that Norwalk Virus is for wimps -- I could do Norwalk standing on my head (note to Norwalk sufferers: I?m just teasing here. Though I do actually suspect I had something more virulent).

But this disorder is surprisingly little known, even among many physicians, so there is much interest among people with GP in educating people about it and increasing the pressure to find a cure.

Here is a link for those seeking more info. And here is a link to an online support group for GP sufferers.

Oh, and a note to those searching for info on what an upper endoscopy feels like: don?t worry, just insist on full sedation -- they put you out with a lovely sedative, you don?t remember anything, and you wake up feeling beautiful and speaking like Tommy Chong.

Click here for a splendid animated gif (GP warning: may cause motion sickness but may be worth it anyway)

-Jeremy

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"A Barely Perceptible Fissure..."

 by Cara

Reading, a month or so ago, about differing takes on the rift between the U.S. and Europe, I had a bit of a Proustian experience. For a minute I suddenly felt as if I were back in High School right smack dab in the middle of reading Poe?s, Fall of the House of Usher. I can remember my teacher going on about the state of old money aristocratic European families and I remember her using a strangely specific word to describe their state of weakness, decay and vulnerability to (anemic/hereditary?) diseases but for the life of me I couldn?t remember what it was.

I went online and poured through every House of Usher related site, skimmed through a copy, and even went to a site devoted to old medical terminology because, the way she spoke of it, she left the impression that it was a real physical malady particular to the wealthy aristocracy. After about 4 hours of searching I gave up, but it?s been driving me crazy ever since.

Well, today I think I found it. Steven Den Beste quoted and linked to Adam Nicolson?s Telegraph column about the transatlantic rift entitled ?US thinks Europeans are cockroaches?. (Sheesh!) Nicolson refers to National Review?s Denis Boyles rendition. Den Beste wrote:

?He (Boyles) caricatures the attitude with this list: "stupid, uneducated, infertile, morally incompetent, socially dead, more animal than human." I don't recognize any of that. I don't think that Europe is collectively stupid, or uneducated. Perhaps a case can be made for infertility, what with their birth rates. As to "moral incompetence", I'm not even sure what the term might mean.
That's not a characterization of Europeans I recognize. I would suggest instead the word effete, for which my dictionary offers three meanings:
1. decadent: characterized by decadence, overrefinement, or overindulgence
2. weak: lacking or having lost the strength or ability to get things done
3. barren: no longer able to reproduce?

Effete; yup, that?s the word. Thanx for clearing that up for me Steven!
- Cara

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November 03, 2003

A Prescription From Dr. Seuss

 by Jeremy

Theodor Seuss Geisel, from Springfield Massachusetts is especially beloved here in my little neck of the western Mass woods. You?ll find our local galleries often proudly displaying this local yokel?s work for all to see. Western Mass has had quite a proud little tradition of open-minded liberal artistry, of challenging norms and taking things to the next level, of, as Amherst College professor Robert Frost wrote, travelling ?the road not taken?. This, in addition to the natural beauty of the landscape and friendliness of the people, was why I came to college here and this was why I eventually settled here. From my first moments out here, having emigrated all the way from central Mass, it felt very much like my natural home, much the same way the left side of the political spectrum has always felt like my natural home.

Mr. Geisel, from 1941 to 1943, wrote a series of political cartoons, a few of which I offered in a post recently, for an outspoken left-wing daily newspaper called PM. Ralph Ingersoll, the paper?s founder and editor, said this of the philosophy behind PM,

?We are against people who push other people around, just for the fun of pushing, whether they flourish in this country or abroad. We are against fraud and deceit and greed and cruelty and we seek to expose their practitioners. We are for people who are kindly and courageous and honest....We propose to applaud those who seek constructively to improve the way men live together. We are American and prefer democracy to any other form of government.?

I can?t think of a better liberal mission statement. This is the essence of the left that I have always known and loved; this is where I live; this is what I always saw as the spirit of the left, sticking up for those who unfairly get kicked around, trying to build a better world, and sticking up for truth and democracy. I have not moved from this home of mine. And notice this mission statement does not say ?We are against rightwing people only who push other people around...? or ?We are against fraud and deceit and greed and cruelty and seek to expose their Republican practitioners and ignore or downplay all left-wing fraud, deceit, greed and cruelty.? Notice the point made, in the first sentence of PM?s stance, of being against people who push others around ?whether they flourish at home or abroad? and notice the lack of moral/cultural relativism; no one here cares about offending bullies as if judging their bad behavior had anything to do with judging their culture, and no one here pretended to know what the root causes of Fascism were let alone lay the blame at America?s, or Britain?s, doorstep.

So many present anti-war ?lefties? have lost touch with a vital part of liberalism: questioning authority EVERYWHERE (even within the lefty home team). They anoint themselves in their righteous hatred of Bush, in their slogans -- ?not in my name? -- and they absolve themselves of any responsibility for what their country?s inaction means for people?s lives. Free of the taint of American imperialism (or whatever) they feel a false sense of purity and they place more value on this idea of purity than on the real consequences of the failure of the world to intervene against fascism. The real life price tag for the luxury of saying ?not in my name? might have been that Saddam?s killing, raping and torturing sprees would continue unimpeded. If you can live with this sort of bargain then your anti-war fervor -- in perfect harmony with the isolationist rationalizations of Pat Buchanan -- is anything but liberal or progressive or left wing.

The left has long said that ?silence = death?, meaning, if you do nothing about a situation where people are dying when doing something to help stop it really is possible, you are in effect colluding with the perpetrators. You can?t just turn it on and off guys. We need to say what we mean and mean what we say and hold our own accountable for their actions and non-actions.

Another problem with too many on the ?left? these days is that they value how someone?s words and ideas sound and/or appear more than they value what someone actually does. They value style over substance. I?ve learned to judge someone?s character by what they do, not by what they say. But so much of the left is still infatuated with the ?impressive? talkers, you know, the ?intellectuals? who say a lot of big exciting and politically correct words/phrases/concepts but ultimately always let you down by not living up to those words with comparable actions. The left loves to be taken in by its own particular brand of con-men and never seems to learn from the likes of, say, Clinton, con-man par-excellence. Crisis requires straight to the point communication, not the cryptic prose of Derrida?s word salad. A Presidential address during war-time should not be a post-modern com-lit lecture, however ?smart?, ?articulate?, and European that may sound. But this infatuation with how words sound never seems to stop the worst on the ?left? from outright name-calling when face to face with these criticisms. And those of you ?lefties? who are above name-calling, hold your weaker brethren accountable for their foibles if you don?t want the entire left to be judged by the actions of these ?few wackos?. That?s what critical thinking is supposed to be about.

Earlier on this blog I wrote a bit about how it feels to wake up one day to find your liberal friends protesting to prevent the toppling of one of the world?s worst mass-murdering tyrants while your ?liberal? friends think it?s you that?s changed. There?s a perception problem here, but they cannot and will not believe it?s their perception that has shifted. And when I suggest this to them, that they?ve drifted with the current of the moment, and of moments past, and have ended up down shore from their abstract progressive ideals, they turn purple and call me a traitor; they shockingly refuse to acknowledge some basic realities of the world and angrily charge me with disloyalty.

I used to really believe the peacenik left had all the clarity and solutions, but I?m not so sure anymore. I?ve woken up, post 9/11, to see that another huge left intellectual blind spot -- a failure to fully own up to the atrocities of communism -- might have been just the kind of riptide of dishonesty that set those lefties adrift toward the current trend of ignoring or downplaying obvious facts about the world around them. And along came postmodernism, with its anesthetizing deconstruction of truth, helping to soothe away the chronic heartburn of responsibility.

For my own ailments, I?ll take a house call from Dr. Seuss.

- Cara

Yeah...what she said!
- Jeremy

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November 02, 2003

Another Shocking Endorsement

 by Jeremy

We might as well admit it: Cara and I are big fans of Jerry Lewis. No, irony, no apology, we're not French. One of Jerry's lesser known talents is photography and, I guess because he spent much of his life in colorfully lit places at night, he seems to have a penchant (you might as well pronounce that with a French accent) for abstract, shaky camera pictures, or "painted pictures." Below is one of his, and below that is a poor imitation that I snapped tonight in Downtown Amherst. This is basically an easy technique, but there's an artistry, a certain clarity of intent (negative capability?) in his pictures that is hard to fake. Anyway, this is my littlle tribute to a transcendentally silly person. Ladies and gentleman, I give you Mr. Jerry Lewis.

photo by Jerry Lewis photo by Jeremy Brown

-Jeremy

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