THE ABSURD NOTION OF MICHAEL IGNATIEFF AS "A TRUE PATRIOT SON"

POSTED RESPONSES TO A COLUMN BY MICHAEL VALPY IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

Ignatieff is as much a patriot as he is a defender of human rights.

Which is to say, not at all.

He is a repulsive opportunist.

After spending his days speaking on behalf of America's brutal imperialism, he just returns to the land of his youth to have a go at a second career as prime minister.

Note I didn't say "returns home" because his past words and actions make it abundantly clear he does not regard Canada with warm feelings.

As much as I dislike Harper, and that is a great deal, Ignatieff is the worst possible alternative to be found on the planet.

He is actually a surprisingly small-minded thinker in many respects, he is overwhelmingly an admirer of American hegemony, he is a defender of torture and bloodshed, and he is putridly smug about himself.

His is a genuinely poisonous presence in our political life, much like having a mole from the CIA running a national party. Indeed, one suspects that that is exactly what he is.

_______________________


The stuff above about Canadians rejecting an intellectual is uninformed rubbish.

As to Ignatieff's being better able to succeed in Europe, again rubbish. He has a wide-spread reputation there as "neo-con lite."

The writer must never have heard Ignatieff at any length.

Ignatieff truly is the equivalent of the Walt Disney organization's notion of an intellectual.

That is undoubtedly why he served a stint as a BBC presenter, that broadcast organization in recent years having been reduced to a mere shadow of itself while serving the aims of the likes of Tony Blair’s government.

There is no fierce independence of thought in Ignatieff, the indispensable requirement to wear the laurels of intellectual.

Indeed, quite the opposite.

There are no striking views or original ideas associated with his name. None.

There is no great defense of the little guys of this world, the downtrodden, the abused, the victims, the underdogs of any circumstances that is associated with great intellectuals and with great writers, the kind of thing Graham Greene considered indispensable to the title of writer.

There is a great deal of wordiness, much of it rather mannered, stylized, dry, much like a costly garment wrapping around nothing.

BELIEF THAT THE EARTH WAS FLAT: THE OLDEST NONSENSE TAUGHT IN SCHOOLS

RESPONSE TO A POSTED COMMENT IN THE INDEPENDENT

Belief that the earth was flat?

Sorry, no educated person believed that in Henry VIII's time or even long before.

That is a loose notion from six-grade geography teachers.

Eratosthenes calculated an fairly accurate diameter for the earth in about the third century BCE.

Ptolemy, centuries later, calculated a much less accurate one.

The issue amongst early explorers was really over whose calculation was right, the differences representing vast distances to Asia.

It is only the views of educated people that counts in matters like this since there will always be people who have odd superstitions and ill-founded ideas.

Even today, I'm sure there are inhabitants of remote Africa, Indonesia, or South America who believe the world is flat.




NO EDUCATED PERSON BELIEVED THIS

HENRY VIII AND THE THEORY THAT HIS WOUNDS CAUSED HIS TYRANT BEHAVIOR

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE INDEPENDENT

It has been a theory for a very long time advanced by some biographers that Henry's leg wound, a suppurating wound for the rest of his life, was responsible for his tyrant behavior.

Certainly in his youth, apart from a handsome athletic appearance, he enjoyed the company of intellectuals and was a fairly impressive scholar himself, as well as a musician and writer.

Elizabeth inherited his intellect with her ability to speak six languages and her love of music.

He apparently had a rather sweet temperament, although he allowed no one to assume any sense of equality in his presence.

It is not impossible there was a genetic strain in Henry - exacerbated by his pain - because Henry VII had a seriously mean streak himself and Elizabeth at times displayed a colossally ugly temper.

As to Anne Boleyn's miscarriage, I don't think that was her downfall.

Anne's strong, rather controlling personality was.

Once the long pursuit and courtship were over, that side of Anne's temperament showed clearly (she was the Great Elizabeth's mother after all), and Henry did not like any sense of competition from women.

AN OBAMA DOCTRINE?

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY CLIVE CROOK IN THE FINANCIAL TIMES


The world, thank you very much, will do quite well without an "Obama Doctrine."

What's wrong with the idea of a chief executive who simply does his job without pretense to imperial or papal grandeur?

The pomposity of the various presidential doctrines - many of them rather shabby statements when their fancy wrap and ribbons are removed - indeed, the very use of the word "doctrine" is the surest sign of American's having fully absorbed the concept of empire.

The president is, after all, just an elected official with a limit on his/her time in office.

THE UPCOMING PULITZER PRIZES AND THE GENERAL FOOLISHNESS OF PRIZES

RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY DANIEL FINKELSTEIN IN THE TIMES

Prizes generally are foolish business.

Even the most prestigious - the Nobel - often gets it wrong. Just look at the winners in literature. The authors loved and read often are not on the list. Those on the list include those few read. In science even we find things like Einstein having won for one of his lesser contributions, not relativity.

The Peace Prize is compromised beyond meaning with several leaders whose hands are very bloody receiving it, all in the hope one presumes of influencing the course of events.

The Academy Award is just silliness, although people like it for exactly that reason. Goofy gowns, goofier speeches, and Fred Astaire glitter.

Some terrible films have won. Just recall Liz Taylor in Butterfield 8, an unwatchable, bad movie, even in its day. And then there are the fad films – Dances with Wolves - which are heaped with prizes despite being good but not original work.

The Pulitzer is the most hopeless prize of all. It has not only got it wrong many times, it has been hopelessly compromised by crooked journalists and crooked newspapers. A New York Times correspondent in Russia in the early part of the century we now know won for totally created material. And there have been more scandalous examples in recent decades. The prize has a flag-waving agenda that has nothing to do with quality or ideas or even journalism.

Just consider the oleaginous laureate Thomas Friedman, a man whose job is to rewrite Pentagon material and other imperial propaganda into chirpy copy.

With history books, it has often missed great books while giving awards to second-rate or boring work.

Just consider the odd idea that there must be a best each year in anything. It just isn't so. Creativity and genius don’t follow clocks or calendars.

Science for example progresses steadily but often with spectacular work only coming after years or decades.

IT IS ALMOST MEANINGLESS TO APPLY THE WESTERN LANGUAGE OF RIGHTS TO MANY PARTS OF THE WORLD INCLUDING AFGHANISTAN

POSTED RESPONSE TO AN EDITORIAL IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

This is a silly leather-armchair-by-the-window editorial.

You are imposing concepts on a place which, in general, has no more grasp of them than they do quantum mechanics.

Afghanistan never has been any thing but a collection of tribes. It is not a country in the sense that we understand. It has no meaningful central government, no bureaucracy, and few roads.

Yes, it is a colored patch on our maps, but even its borders are vague, the main border with Pakistan simply being a line drawn by a British official about a century ago.

For the people living on each side of that border, the so-called Durand Line, it is meaningless. They are tribal people, the same tribe living on both sides of that line.

Afghanistan is nothing but a collection of tribes, many of them living impoverished, hardscrabble lives in an environment of barren mountains and deserts.

They are hard people with ancient, unpleasant customs and attitudes, owing to their harsh circumstances which is precisely why the idea of defeating them is, and always has been, ridiculous.

A place like this only makes progress through steady economic growth, and you don’t get that from guns and bombs, America’s idea of a human-rights mission.

America invaded to kill people, not to help anyone, and Canada has been sadly dragged along for the ride.

The world is so much more complicated than this view. It is not a place entirely to our liking. Ancient, anti-progressive customs and attitudes come with the territory of poverty and economic backwardness, much as malaria or high infant mortality.

Go try enforcing anti-homophobia in Jamaica or rural Africa. Go try teaching women's rights in rural India or South America. In any of these places, you could be killed just for your words.




AFGHAN WOMEN STILL MOSTLY WEARING BURKAS



INTENSE HOMOPHOBIA IN JAMAICA



BRIDE BURNING IN INDIA



BRIDE BURNING IN INDIA

AMERICA'S CRIMINALLY STUPID WAR ON DRUGS IS JUST ONE PART OF A LARGER PATTERN OF BEHAVIOR

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY CLIVE CROOK IN THE FINANCIAL TIMES

Yes, indeed, a criminally stupid war on drugs.

Intelligent analysts have said this for many years. Milton Friedman wrote on this subject, fearing for the loss of basic freedoms in America with police crashing down doors and waving deadly weapons around in people’s homes on mere suspicion or the tips of others wishing "to get" someone.

But the intelligent analysts’ efforts have been all to no purpose.

Why?

Look at the stomach-turning television shows of a few years back, shows like 'Cops,' showing the clearest police brutality and disregard for human rights. These shows were actually very popular.

Consider the incarceration rate in the United States, the highest in the advanced world by far, although that clearly has not impacted the United States’ claims to the highest murder and violent crime rates in the advanced world.

The United States, with its obsessive/compulsive personality disorder, knows no other way of doing things.

The template for the war on drugs has been applied yet again to the mindless war on terror. Of course, you cannot have a war on methods or beliefs and, of course, the use of terror to strike back for injustices is as old as civilization, but those elemental facts do not in any way affect America's current great crusade.

Oh, and we must not forget the decades-long war against godless communism in which the U.S squandered something on the order of 3 trillion dollars and countless lives in other countries, all while building the careers back home of monsters like J. Edgar Hoover.

Hoover broke every rule of decency and human rights and democratic values, yet his name remains in big metal letters on the FBI building in Washington.

What other land speaks at the highest level about democracy and human rights while sending B-52s to carpet-bomb some vaguely threatening people abroad? Who else sends money and warehouses-full of armaments to an abusive state like Israel which uses them to kill children and women while enforcing apartheid and ethnic-cleansing?

But Israel, like the U.S., is a democracy, isn’t it? One, moreover, surrounded by evil too, just the way the U.S. sees itself in the world.

You cannot hope to change America’s insane war on drugs without changing an entire underlying way of thinking, full of lurid delusions, a quite insane way of thinking, actually.




EVERYONE KNOWS BUSH TOOK COCAINE YET THIS SAME SELF-RIGHTEOUS CREATURE NEVER GAVE A PARDON TO THE MANY OFFENDERS FILLING TEXAS'S DEATH ROW AND ITS PRISONS

ON CBC'S LOWERING OF STANDARDS OF EXCELLENCE IN AN EFFORT TO GAIN MASS AUDIENCE: A REGRETTABLE TREND BEST SEEN IN THE EMBARRASSING JIAN GHOMESHI

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

Sorry, you have this matter entirely wrong.

Jian Ghomeshi clearly did not do the required research for an effective interview. He broke the rule every good interviewer knows, that you must know your subject before you meet.

Professionals like Shelagh Rogers or Eleanor Wachtel or Don Newman would never be caught flat-footed as Ghomeshi, something one finds regularly with him. This was only the most embarrassing of many blunders and poor judgments.

He is simply the weakest host ever placed into this once venerable time-slot on CBC Radio.

And it is a very good question as to why he even interviews trashy characters like this guest. The answer is simple: he is the most visible evidence of CBC's lowering its standards and pandering to a mass audience. Who even needs a CBC that tries to compete with trash radio?

Ghomeshi interviewed, some while back, a mother in B.C. whose young daughter was exposed to a raw pornographic magazine (“Butt”) in a store carrying young people’s clothes. It was stupidly used as part of a display.

Ghomeshi literally badgered the mother - mildly, but nevertheless definitely badgered – as though she were the villain in the piece with her complaint, going against free expression.

It wasn’t even a national story, just an embarrassing local business, so why did Ghomeshi feature it? Complete lack of judgment.

What part of children and pornography did Ghomeshi not get I asked? Well, he got his own back, in spades, from this trashy hillbilly, another interview that should never have taken place.

Ghomeshi regularly drags up trashy candidates for interview, as Gene Simmons, the former member of the rock group Kiss, known for his own crude talk.

In another interview, Ghomeshi talked to a pop singer about his girlfriend’s “hot body.” Great, morning public radio is to sound like a locker room?

I simply do not agree that Jian Ghomeshi is "a polite and gracious host." He does not have the skills for his job, and he does not have the wide interests and sharp mind of so many CBC personalities, including other new-generation CBC personalities like the intelligent and talented Matt Galloway.




HERE ARE EXAMPLES OF THE QUALITY OF GUEST MR. GHOMESHI HAS BROUGHT TO WHAT WAS ONCE CBC RADIO'S MOST VENERABLE TIME-SLOT

IGNATIEFF KEEPING HIS POLICY IDEAS CLOSE TO THE VEST?

POSTED RESPONSE TO COLUMN IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

Well, we know where he stood on the use of torture.

And we know where he stood on the illegal invasion of Iraq which has left more than a million corpses and several million refugees.

And he voted with his feet, for all to see, on proper democratic process for his party's leadership: against it if it is to his personal advancement.

So I know more than enough.

I don't care what policies - or should I say slogans - he has tucked away.

Ignatieff does not deserve our support.

OBAMA GETS A TOKEN 5000 MORE TROOPS FOR AFGHANISTAN FROM NATO: AN IMPRESSIVE NUMBER OF DRIVERS COOKS AND MEDICS

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE INDEPENDENT

I am impressed: five thousand more cooks, drivers, and medics.

It just could not be clearer that NATO does not agree with the United States' twisted view that Afghanistan is a serious threat.

You do not have to plea, bribe, and threaten - as the U.S. has done over and over in recent years - to get nations who genuinely feel endangered to help fight.

There is no threat.

Even Obama's charming personality and the world's great wishes for his success in cleaning up the horrors left behind by Bush cannot cause NATO's leaders to take this pontless engagement seriously.

The U.S. made a colossal mistake invading Afghanistan, and once there it did not even know what to do, other than killing a lot of people and committing a number of hideous war crimes.

It has established a government there no one respects. It has established former Northern Alliance warlords in the provinces, people in many cases just as repulsive as the Taleban. Its invasion released a flood of hard drugs on the world. It blubbered about women - as a propaganda ploy, its invasion being about killing, not women's rights - yet today the burka is seen everywhere outside the capital, and even in the capital, it is worn by half of women.

And no one, other than the delusional, can believe you can change the patterns of an ancient, hardscrabble society of 25 million. They will leave the 14th century as they experience sustained economic growth, and no other way.

The five thousand non-combat troops might well be called a politely-offered fig leaf for America's delicate dignity.




OBAMA GETS HIS FIG LEAF FROM NATO

BLAIR AND HIS BLUBBERING ABOUT RELIGION

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE INDEPENDENT

Blair was always a preacher, never a statesman.

Now he is where he belongs, mouthing vapidities and hurting no one.

Unfortunately, he leaves behind about a million dead in Iraq, hundreds of thousands wounded and crippled, millions with no employment, and a couple of million refugees.

I've heard of people who went into the wrong work doing damage before, but surely this is a case for the record books.

Considering what his words actually produced over the last decade, you really have to wonder about religious people paying attention to this hare-brain.

OBAMA'S LETTING GO HIS NATIONAL SECURITY APPOINTEE AND THE ISRAEL LOBBY

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE INDEPENDENT

This is one of the few times the unpleasant truth behind a high-level American decision has been exposed so clearly.

There isn't even a question in this matter.

The Israel Lobby acted here quickly and overwhelmingly to eliminate the appointment of a highly qualified man they happen to regard as too independent in his thinking regarding the Middle East.

It is stunning that a country of 7 million so deeply influences the policies and decisions of the leader of 300 million, a country of 7 million, moreover, with violently paranoid behaviors and an unwillingness to make any sacrifice for peace.

It is a potentially dangerous and de-stabilizing situation when it comes to matters like Iran.

It really is time for Israel to make peace and stop abusing its neighbors, but the only force on earth that can force Israel to do so is the American government.

But the American government seems incapable of exercising the least independent or fair judgment here, even under a strong, intelligent, and popular leader like Obama.




A DISTINGUISHED AND ABLE CHARLES FREEMAN AND HE IS JEWISH - BUT TOO INDEPENDENT-MINDED FOR THE ISRAEL LOBBY

NORTH KOREA'S MISSILE TEST AND THE ASSERTION THAT THE COUNTRY DEFIED THE UNITED STATES

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE INDEPENDENT

Defied?

I was unaware that Washington served in a paternal role in North Korean affairs. It is an independent country, fairly looking to its own defences.

I am certainly no admirer of North Korea, but I understand their fears. When you have nuclear weapons and capable missiles, you don't end up like Iraq.

With all the flap artificially generated by Washington over this event, people lose sight of some real facts.

The U.S. remains the only country ever actually to use nuclear weapons. It used them twice, both times on civilians.

Younger readers may not know that during the Korean Conflict General MacArthur was ready to use nuclear weapons on China. He was more than psychologically ready, he pushed hard and planned the attack out. Thank God, reason prevailed.

And MacArthur's intended use of nuclear weapons followed on his advance to the Yalu River, an act which the Chinese had long before warned they must regard as a threat to the security of China.

The only country in the world literally to take over another country in recent years, again, is the United States.

The only country in the world that maintains a large and secret nuclear arsenal is America's subsidized client, Israel, and it maintains this arsenal in perhaps the most sensitive part of our planet, casting a threatening shadow for a thousand miles around and inciting others to follow its example for their own safety.

MORE TIRESOME CRAP ON THE WAR ON TERROR

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY WESLEY WARK IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

Wesley Wark's piece is just intellectual Jello.

The very idea of a war on terror was an absurdity from the beginning.

You cannot have a war on a method.

Terror is the vengeance taken by the suppressed and voiceless as it is sometimes also the work of psychopaths with an ideal.

Terror is as old as organized warfare.

Indeed, today the word "terror" is pretty much become meaningless owing to the work of organized warfare.

Since WWII organized warfare always and everywhere kills more civilians than soldiers, and it uses ever more terrible weapons to do so.

I don't know of any terror organization with a record one-tenth as appalling as, for example, the United States.

Two atomic bombs dropped on civilian targets. Terrible fire-bombings of civilian cities. Three million slaughtered in Vietnam and a legacy of Agent Orange and land mines left to kill and cripple for a century. A million killed in Iraq and a modern society reduced to poverty. Prisoners of war by thousands exterminated in Afghanistan.

Any thoughtful person might well say, what the hell is Mr. Wark talking about?

Well, he is in a business that makes its living through fear.




I SEE A DEAD HUMAN BEING, A RESIDENT OF AFGHANISTAN, AND AN AMERICAN THUG POSING AS A BIG-GAME HUNTER, BUT I DON'T SEE ANY WAR ON TERROR




OH, HERE IT IS: THE WAR ON TERROR

HORRIBLE NEW LAWS IN AFGHANISTAN IN ONE ODD WAY DO REPRESENT PROGRESS

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

Well, we have made progress of a sort in Afghanistan.

We've come full circle from Bush's propaganda of years ago about women in Afghanistan, propaganda intended to win over soccer moms to an invasion that had nothing to do with human rights.

The place we've come to is to realize that you cannot change the culture and habits of an ancient, backward society in a few years, and especially with the use of armies.

Trying to alter the society of Afghanistan is like stepping back in time to fourteenth century France and trying to get women out of the convents and nuns out of their habits.

Ridiculous. And you'd only have made yourself an enemy to attempt doing so.

Only time and economic growth will change things in Afghanistan.

And surely it is clear to most that you do not get economic growth by bombs and invasion.

As I've said before, the U.S. would have achieved more dropping dollar bills on the countryside from its planes.





AN AMERICAN HUMAN-RIGHTS MISSION




GEE, SHE'S NOT FROM THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY - MORE LIKE THE EARLY 20TH

MORE ON GEORGE GALLOWAY'S NOT BEING ADMITTED TO CANADA

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

This is a shameful episode for Canada.

George Galloway is an honest and outspoken man, and it is only for being honest and outspoken that he was excluded from Canada.

What are the apologists for Israel's bloody deeds so afraid of that they must try to stop those who disagree with them from speaking?

The answer of course is always the same nonsense: Hamas is a terrorist organization.

In fact, Hamas is a democratic and honest organization, perfectly willing to come to a modus vivendi with Israel, but not willing to do whatever Israel demands before there even are talks. Perfectly sensible.

It is all so bitterly ironic. Israel was founded with the ugly terror of the Irgun and the Stern and other murderous groups, but now it is everyone else who is a terrorist.

And we must never forget Israel just killed 400 children and a 1000 others for nothing.

All Galloway did was bring some emergency supplies and turn them over to the people who are the government in Gaza.

_______________________

"I would argue that Galloway's message (whatever it is), has become lost in his own self-importance..."

Self importance? Bringing emergency supplies to people Israel just decimated and still keeps penned up like livestock?

It was, anyway, David Hume who so rightly pointed out that seeking for the glory of worthy deeds was itself worthy.

People - none of them - ever acts without a component of ego; it just is not possible.

And anyone who claims otherwise is either being dishonest or a fool.

______________________

"A blowhard of a "career politician" of over 20 years in office is hardly credible either Mr. Galloway. Have you had any position of power while in office? What has he done for his local constituents? We don't need any hypocritical politicians here from overseas, we already have enough of our own!"

You, sir, may believe such rubbish, but I do think that in a free country others are entitled to decide for themselves.

That is the very essence of a free society, not the poor judgment and still poorer information of people like yourself and the Conservative government.

_____________________

"This is a lie. Hamas has called for the destruction of Israel. That's very "moderate" of them. Jeez. I'm willing to listen to both sides but I can't recall the Israeli government every publicly calling for the genocide of Palestinians."

Oh please, Israel just murdered 400 kids plus a thousand others, and it keeps 1,500,000 people penned up like cattle.

And just a little while before that, it killed another 1,400 in Lebanon.

It refuses to tell the UN even where it dropped its godawful cluster bombs by the thousands, so that those horrible things can keep killing.

Only someone with a rather bizarre imagination could possibly believe Hamas could ever do anything serious against Israel. That's a more ridiculous claim than saying Canada threatens the U.S.

And, although I am sure it has escaped your attention, Hamas never used the word genocide. It only refuses to recognize Israel - a common negotiating position - and says Israel will come to an end eventually.

You might check your dictionary, but that last is not the same thing as genocide.

It is indeed something that a secret report of the CIA’s also said recently, saying Israel would likely dissolve into a Palestinian-Jewish state with many settlers returning to the U.S. and Europe. All within twenty years.

My, how dreadful.







IF YOU ARE AGAINST GEORGE GALLOWAY, IT DOES TEND TO MEAN YOU ACCEPT THIS

ON GEORGE GALLOWAY'S BEING REFUSED ENTRY TO CANADA

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY REX MURPHY IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

Shame on you, Rex Murphy.

This column is a nasty piece of weasel-work, the kind of thing I thought you were above, even though I disagree with many of your views.

You are calling Galloway names, defending what cannot be defended, and, at the same time, suggesting they find a way out of what is a police-state action.

George Galloway is an honorable man. He stands for principles, which more than you can say for Mr. Harper and yourself in this instance.

He has a piercing intelligence. And his way with words leaves even you, Rex, looking the true "sad sack."

He is a member of the Mother of Parliaments in good standing. There is no legitimate reason on earth to refuse him entry to Canada.

The only reason he is being treated in this police-state fashion is his views on the poor people of Palestine.

Israel's apologists simply hate him.

How shameful of you to speak disparagingly against him, but not a word about Israel's murder of 400 children and a thousand other people.

And to this day Israel will not supply the UN maps of where they dropped the dreaded cluster bombs in Southern Lebanon during another savage attack which killed another 1,400 or so, including a brave Canadian officer doing his duty.

IS OBAMA SIMPLY RE-BRANDING BUSH POLICIES?

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY CLIVE CROOK IN THE FINANCIAL TIMES

I do think you are drawing conclusions here too early.

In foreign affairs, we have yet to see the essence of Obama's policies.

I agree that words he has used so far are mostly "rebranding" Bush, but it is impossible in a country like the United States to come in and just change course entirely.

Words may be used to ease the way to new policies. After all, American presidents never tell the truth leading into their policies, and the last president was positively a psychopathic liar. He murdered a million people based on lies.

I think clearly Obama’s hope in Afghanistan is to quietly reach a modus Vivendi and get out of that useless, pointless conflict. I think he will quietly deal with Taleban supporters, at least factions of them after his big show of force.

Were he to do things in a different way, in a bold, straightforward way, he would quickly become political road-kill in the United States. The political system is so corrupt and distorted that the real arguments in most great issues are never made.

And we must remember, the gigantic, powerful establishment any new leader faces in the United States: the military establishment, the intelligence colossus, the corporate benefactors of Bush’s years, and the many Borgia-like families who treat the U.S. much like their private playpen.

I never did believe Obama could make remarkable progress against these and other entrenched interests. America is a very conservative country at heart, conservative in the worst sense of that word. It is also a great imperial power whose people believe naively in the quasi-religious tenet that America is a bastion of freedom and human rights.

But I will be pleased with some moderate progress on a few fronts, and I think we must just be grateful we have a reasonable man leading, rather than a cretin.

Imperial Rome will only reduce its arrogance and pretensions and propensity to war when other centers of power have fully emerged.





AMERICA'S LIBERTY





ROME'S ATHENA

THE FRITZEL HORROR AND OTHER DARK TRUTHS

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY GEORGE PITCHER IN THE TELEGRAPH

We know that in the case of child abuse of various types, parents or close relatives are responsible for something on the order of 80% of cases.

It is rarely a stranger doing such things, despite parents' inordinate fears of children falling into the wrong hands.

I think it is likely true that sexual abuse by parents is far commoner than most believe.

Many of our old dark fairy tales and myths suggest this.

We also see it as quite common in places like parts of Africa where men routinely rape young girls.

And we know from studies that many prostitutes had childhoods with fathers that raped them.

We are a savage species, chimpanzees with bigger brains, but the brains do not overcome our nasty origins.

Remember, in a number of species in the animal world, fathers often kill the children.

We are, as Mark Twain said in his last years, the damned human race.

And just look at our willingness to kill large numbers of children in war. The U.S. and Britain killed thousands in Iraq. Israel just killed four hundred in Gaza.




OUR SOMEWHAT BIGGER BRAIN ONLY MAGNIFIES OUR ABILITY TO INFLICT PAIN AND KILL

THE STONING OF GEORGE GALLOWAY'S EMERGENCY ASSISTANCE MISSION TO GAZA IS NOT ABOUT GAZA BUT IRAN?

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY DANIEL FINKELSTEIN IN THE TIMES

Daniel, these are not well-considered comments.

First, you are totally inconsistent.

You quote Mubarak as though he were a fair and impartial authority in these matters.

President Mubarak is a dictator, one of decades standing, and he has some very large interests in supporting American policies, about $2 billion a year in keeping-the-peace payoffs for a start.

At the same time, you always have been a defender of Israel's de rigueur
position that Hamas - a truly democratic organization - is a terrible bunch of beasts.

And, as we know from other times, you promote the also de rigueur position about the great blessings of democracy in Israel.

Mubarak is little more than a thug, but he is a peaceful thug towards Israel so I guess that makes his opinion worthy?

As to Haaretz, quoting Israelis on anything having to do with Gaza, or Iran for that matter, is rather like quoting a South African paper in the heyday of apartheid on events in a Bantustan. The view is utterly predictable.

I object strenuously to your calling George Galloway a "blustering fool" if only because it so clearly untrue.

Galloway has a piercing intelligence, and he is, without a doubt, the most remarkable orator in Britain today.

His mission on this delivery of assistance to a people left shattered by three weeks of bombardment is not something to make light of.

How do you know, Daniel, that the stone-throwers were not Israeli agents? My God, we have boundless precedents for such activity and worse.

If the stone throwers were indeed Egyptians, then it is certain they were not acting, as we used to put it during the Cold War, spontaneously.

Spontaneous displays do not happen in Mubarak's Egypt, as I'm sure you well know.

So, I’m sorry to say, I don't find even a shred of honest analysis in your words here, but then you are riding your favorite hobby horse again, aren’t you?

CHINA'S LOCK-DOWN OF TIBET IS TELLING?

POSTED RESPONSE TO AN EDITORIAL IN THE TORONTO GLOBE AND MAIL

No, it is this editorial that is telling.

It forcefully brings home the fact that its writer does not understand the situation in China.

China is a land of great ethnic diversity. No government there can afford to have groups making inordinate demands and creating unrest, which is exactly what the original crack-down in Tibet was in response to.

Tibet has been part of China for many centuries. It enjoyed a brief, brief period of a degree of independence.

Most critics of China are not even aware of this history.

I don't know about the editorial writer, but I vividly remember Detroit being "locked down" with armed forces killing something like 44 rioters in the street and marching around with bayonets.

I also remember a large part of Los Angeles being locked down and more than 20 people being shot by armed forces in the street.

The same for a portion of Chicago.

Oh, and I'd like to see what happens to people who organize a party to give back the Hawaiian Islands or New Mexico or Texas. Believe me, the terror laws would be applied swiftly.

China has done nothing - absolutely nothing - you would not see in the United States under similar circumstances.





MANY AMERICANS CONFUSE TIBET WITH SHANGRI-LA

FRUM TAKES ON LIMBAUGH BUT IS ANYTHING BUT A HERO HIMSELF

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY DANIEL FINKELSTEIN IN THE TIMES

Rush Limbaugh is one of the ugliest phenomena in American politics, perhaps only exceeded by Ann Coulter.

But the group from which David Frum has made his living for years is the group that has used and rewarded Limbaugh for his years of service as America's Lord Haw Haw.

David has some very dark marks against his own name, some of which you will find discussed in this article I wrote some years ago.

He is anything but a hero.

http://chuckmanotherchoiceofwords.blogspot.com/search/label/CHUCKMAN%20ARTICLE%3A%20SICK%20PUPPIES%20-%20OR%20THE%20DANGEROUS%20DELUSIONS%20OF%20NEO-CONS





VILLAIN? HE DEFINITELY QUALIFIES



BUT HERO? I DON'T THINK SO - ACTUALLY THEY DESERVE EACH OTHER: TWO RIGHT-WING PORKERS PAID BY THE POUND OF WORDS

NEWLY DISCOVERED PORTRAIT: RALEIGH OR SHAKESPEARE?

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE TELEGRAPH

It remains a fair question.

The portrait has the good looks we would expect from an actor, Shakespeare's first calling.

But then Raleigh was one of Elizabeth's most prominent courtiers, and we know that group only included handsome men. Elizabeth was picky about brains and looks.

The eyes indicate intelligence, but Raleigh too was an exceptionally intelligent man.

If the sonnets are to be believed, Shakespeare was gay, and I have to say the face in this portrait does not appear to be that of a gay man, although one certainly cannot always tell such things.

The beautiful clothing in the portrait - actually the finest portion of the painting - would be what you expect in one of Elizabeth's courtiers. They used to outdo each other in trying to impress at court.

Shakespeare's theater work had undoubtedly made him a man of some means, but I'm not sure this made him so well-off that he could wear such finery. Then again, people undoubtedly wore their "Sunday best" for such portraits.

The other doubt in my mind is Shakespeare's status in the early 17th century. Theater was not a completely respectable business as it is today. Would a prominent theater person have a portrait commissioned?

On the other hand, this does not seem to me the face of a man of action, and that was what Raleigh was in spades.

But even if the portrait were to be Shakespeare's, that leaves completely unsettled the matter of whether he wrote the plays or provided a cover for someone else.





WHO IS HE?

CANADA'S MISSION IS FAILING IN AFGHANISTAN

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY JEFFREY SIMPSON IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

I don't know what else was ever expected.

Of course, the truth is nothing was legitimately expected because this entire enterprise showed no genuine planning or forethought.

The original American invasion was stupid and pointless, pure vengeance with no clear purpose.

The Taleban were not responsible for 9/11, but the U.S. was thirsting for blood and so the country had to be invaded.

Since then they've killed thousands and thousands of innocent people and bombed the crap out of this poor country, all while claiming they are improving it.

They've committed war crimes, including complicity in the savage killing of several thousand prisoners.

Our joining in on the basis of "owing one to the Pentagon" could result only in the costly, pointless operation in which we are now engaged.

Yes, the odd poll says people are glad for us, but all that means is that in such a poor, backward country people are glad to get whatever they can free from foreign soldiers.

Also polls cannot possibly reflect the population there since no one is going to poll the Taleban or many remote villages.





AMERICA DELIVERS ANOTHER LOAD FOR DEMOCRACY

IS INTELLIGENCE HERITABLE?

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY DANIEL FINKELSTEIN IN THE TIMES

There is a lot of confused thinking around this subject. In the U.S., I.Q. tests in the public schools were done away with years ago. The reason: the tests consistently showed below average performance for black children.

I do think the word “race” is so contaminated from history that it must to be avoided, but we can accurately speak of groups in so far as the members of a group share a bundle of characteristics from thousands of years of common history and adaptation to various places and conditions.

The I.Q. test is an imperfect concept, of course, but we know to a certainty that the test has a certain degree of predictive ability for certain types of success. The very term “intelligence” itself is imperfect, leading to many vaguely defined concepts including the hazy idea of multiple intelligences coming from an educator at Harvard

Of course, all statements about various groups’ performance in these tests are statistical in nature. They do not necessarily apply to any given individual.

No one of good sense prejudges anyone's abilities from color or ethnicity, but we know the groupings inaccurately called race include many general characteristics other than skin color. For example, Caucasians, Blacks, and Asians are all known to suffer in different statistical patterns from various diseases and conditions. Patterns in the incidence of everything from heart disease to diabetes are quite different. Why would we expect it be any different with characteristics of the body’s most complex organ, the brain? Is such knowledge to be cast aside in the name of political correctness?

Millions of IQ tests in the U.S. – from public schools and armed forces enlistment - do show fairly dramatically that there are differences between groups. When you have millions of observations for any phenomenon, you know you are dealing with something real.

These millions of tests show 'Caucasians' with a mean IQ of about 100, 'Blacks' with a mean IQ of 85, and 'Asians' (and Ashkenazi Jews) with a mean score in the range of 107-115.

IQ tests only certain skills, skills around problem-solving and mathematical reasoning. There are many other human skills not captured by the scores.

But life experience in many countries does tend to confirm that the specific skills measured by IQ are important in a number of careers. Business, finance, and science are notable for high numbers of Jews and Asians and low numbers of Blacks. We find this pattern in country after country. It is not prejudice to observe it.

The abilities measured by IQ - the abilities to solve certain kinds of problems and math skills – surely contribute directly to these easily observable results.

We see a much smaller presence of black people in these fields, and it cannot be sensibly argued that this is owing to prejudice. Opportunities to go to any school are today wonderfully open in all qualified in advanced countries.

Now, look at the sports field. American football, baseball, basketball are virtually dominated by blacks (who constitute 13% of the population) owing to their innate athletic skills and strength. The same for professional boxing.

Why should these observations cause vituperation?

These are not arguments for prejudice or racism. They are arguments for better dealing with many social problems.

There is an unfortunate syndrome of black behaviors we see consistently demonstrated in country after country - Britain, United States, Canada, South Africa, Jamaica, and many others.

These include having children early, absentee fathers, dropping out of school in large numbers, attraction to gangs and violence, and lack of economic success on average.

At the other extreme of human experience, what do we see in the behavior of Asians and Jews? Putting off having children, almost always finishing school, strong bonds from fathers for children, much less violent activity, and remarkable economic success in free countries.

You can't deal properly with any problem when you pretend it doesn't exist.

We test for a multitude of things against which people do not argue.

We test everything from pulse and blood pressure to agility and speed. We test the efficient working of various internal organs. We test artistic ability. We test acquired knowledge. We test driving skills. We test sight.

Why does this one test, whose meaning really is limited to certain kinds of problem solving, raise so much heat?

We know that there are vast differences in results just within any one group. Are these differences imaginary or culturally induced? There is no basis for saying that.

So why, when a comparison between groups is made, does the test become worthless, biased, culturally contaminated, and a host of other pejorative adjectives?

We all see regularly, with our own eyes, people who are clever at what they do and people who are barely able to function. These are the extremes, but everyone falls somewhere on the spectrum.

What is the least odd or prejudiced in saying there are differences between groups if the empirical results warrant the statement?

Prisoners are routinely tested for IQ as one component of understanding their actions and for their rehabilitation. Criminals do tend to have lower intelligence, as well as many mental illnesses. Labs regularly test for IQ in studies to determine the effects of chemicals or new drugs. Scientists typically put study results of, say, the impact of certain chemicals on children in terms of how many I.Q. points are lost.

This is a topic society is going to have to deal with eventually.

OBAMA KEEPS AFGHANISTAN VERSION OF GUANTANAMO AT BAGRAM AIRBASE GOING

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE INDEPENDENT

I am sorry to read of this.

But it is America that Obama leads, not Ronald Reagan's fantasy shining city on a hill.

America is an imperial power with a vast network of intelligence agencies, secret police, military officials, corporate war profiteers, and powerful, ruthless old families much resembling the Borgias of Italy centuries ago.

You cannot just reverse what these groups believe is in their interests. If you try, you put yourself at risk.

America's establishment can ruin you and even eliminate you.

There are the examples of Clinton who became the center of sleazy scandal, going down in history as a shabby failure, and Kennedy who died trying to fight some very powerful interests. His brother too.

I firmly believe Obama's basic instincts are not bent towards this sort of overseas criminal behavior - something not typically true of American presidents, men like Bush or Nixon or Johnson being quite comfortable with it - but he is not in a position to change America's excesses.

What we get with Obama is an intelligent and decent man who will make at least some decisions in light of broader interests. I'm afraid that is the most we can hope for.

Those who wished for more were hoping for what cannot be.




I AM AFRAID THIS IS AS CLOSE AS AMERICA GETS TO A SHINING CITY ON A HILL

MORE ANTI-MUSLIM GARBAGE IN THE DAILY TELEGRAPH

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY DENIS MACEOIN IN THE TELEGRAPH

Denis MacEoin, this piece lacks any perspective, save that of uninformed, paranoid anti-Islamism.

It is just irresponsible to write such stuff, feeding prejudice with red meat.

We have many, many religious groups that do not mix with mainline society.

Mennonites in many parts of the world stay to themselves, living in segregated communities, and refuse even to drive cars. Traditionally, members who violate the rules face the devastating fate of being "shunned," ignored by everyone in the community.

Ultra-Orthodox Jews behave in even more extreme ways. They dress in similar 19th century costumes, live in segregated communities, and maintain elaborate, and even oppressive, rules for that must be followed. Women cannot even leave their husbands without the threat of losing their children while men may readily divorce a wife.

How about all the Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Christians who still live in monasteries and abbeys?

How about Buddhist monks?

Extreme evangelical Christians tend to avoid much of normal everyday society, disapproving of many mainstream activities. They found their own schools and other institutions with this aim in mind.

Then there are all the non-religious groups that tend to behave in similar ways, everything from nudists to survivalists.

God, isn’t it time we stop publishing anti-Muslim garbage?




DO MENNONITES INTEGRATE? NO. ARE THEY GOOD AND VALUABLE CITIZENS? YES.

TONY BLAIR'S PEACE AWARD: WHAT IT IS REALLY ABOUT

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY ANDREW PIERCE IN THE TELEGRAPH

Andrew Pierce couldn't be more right in his main theme.

Blair is a ghoul, an ethical nullity, still collecting booty years after his crimes.

But the author does overlook the actual meaning of this award.

The award had nothing to do with peace as most understand that word.

It comes from Israel, and the blood-drenched policies of Bush and Blair served what Israel sees as its interests.

Why else is Bush so praised in Israel, the only country in the world, including his own, where the man is not despised?

Israelis have some very odd ideas of peace, after all.

They include never speaking to their opponents, assassinating their leaders, imprisoning others, and holding a vast population almost in bondage.

Attacking a refugee camp like Gaza with bombs and tanks – for that is what Gaza is, full of refugees from earlier horrors Israel inflicted on Palestinians – is about far from peace as you can get, but it served what Israeli leaders saw as their needs.

And it couldn’t have happened without the quiet approval of Blair’s comrade in war crimes, the wretched Bush.




PERHAPS ONLY IN ISRAEL WOULD PEOPLE THINK THIS WORTHY OF A PEACE PRIZE




BLAIR MIGHT ALSO HAVE GOT THIS AWARD, BUT NOT BEING AN AMERICAN CITIZEN DISQUALIFIED HIM

A FORMER GUARD WRITES OF GUANTANAMO BUT SADLY MAKES THE ERROR OF SAYING IT IS AGAINST WHAT AMERICA STANDS FOR

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY BRANDON NEELY IN THE INDEPENDENT

Thank you for this, Brandon Neely.

But your statement near the end that "it [Guantanamo] goes against everything the United States of America stands for" simply does not reflect historical facts.

Guantanamo, to paraphrase H. Rapp Brown, is as American as cherry pie.

America's is a bloody history, full of injustice. The only reason we don't speak of the growth of America as being like that of Imperial Germany is that America's victims were mostly weak and poorly organized, rather than established European states.

Of course, we all know how America first ethnically cleansed the East of Indians in the "Trail of Tears." Thousands died in this hideous operation. All their land and homes were stolen.

Years later, when it wanted the very land these people had ruthlessly been removed to, America pretty much tried to exterminate them in a long series of mass slaughters.

We all know about a couple of hundred years of slavery and then a hundred years of Jim Crow.

But many Europeans - and more than a few Americans - do not know of the shameful Mexican War.

Or the shameful Spanish-American War, started with a phony claim over a warship.

Or the U.S. efforts to put down rebellion against its rule in the Philippines, where torture was widely used. Water-boarding started there.

Many do not know the ugly story of the annexation of Hawaii. The entire population there signed a petition against the American take-over and sent a delegation to Washington to present it to Congress. No one would even talk to them.

Few in Europe know of the many mass murders of blacks during the 1920s. Whole small communities, hundreds at a time, were wiped out and their land was stolen. There bodies went to mass graves.

The homes and farms and other property stolen from Japanese Americans during WWII Internment was never returned. The later compensation was a pittance for many compared to what was stolen.

There are many other ugly stories over just two centuries, and it is simply incorrect to play the Ronald Reagan theme of the shining city on a hill. It just ain't true.




MASSACRE IN KOREA




WOUNDED KNEE MASSACRE




MASSACRE AT MAI LAI VIETNAM




ONE OF THOUSANDS OF LYNCHINGS

ON ISRAEL AND GAZA AND THE TIRED CHARGE THAT CRITICISM OF ISRAEL IS ANTI-SEMITISM

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE INDEPENDENT

Howard Jacobson,

Yours is a shamefully dishonest article.

You are playing word games with mass murder, and truly, in the end, your circumlocutions restate the same disgusting tactic used by the defenders of Israel's bloody excesses: you are anti-Semitic if you criticize Israel.

Is Israel a country like any other or is it not? That truly is the heart of the matter.

If it is a country like any other, then its savage behavior in Lebanon and in Gaza and in the West Bank is completely unacceptable.

It has nothing to do with any "ism."

But if Israel is somehow to be considered by different standards than other countries, if it is to have special rules and allowances, then the real "ism" involved here is Israeli exceptionalism.

You cannot have it both ways, try as you might.

Israel does not talk to its opponents ever. It makes only public show of talking to a pathetic man like Abbas. The others it either assassinates - and there have been many bloody assassinations - or labels as "terrorists."

These are the techniques of tyrants, not states which respect human rights and democratic values.

Just because Israel is technically a democracy does not mean it cannot act as a tyrant.

A prejudiced majority can keep a technically democratic state behaving like a gang of thugs. We saw this in the American South. We saw this in apartheid South Africa. We saw this with France in Algeria. And we see this in Israel.

Even as Israel went about the business of killing, among others, 400 kids in Gaza, in the West Bank more of other people's land and homes was being seized.

How can anyone possibly regard this in a positive light?

If Israel would start treating its opponents with decency and respect and agree to return to its 1967 borders, we could have peace, genuine peace.

It is not Hamas that prevents this happening. Hamas has shown readiness to talk and reach a modus vivendi more than once. It kept the previous truce agreement scrupulously, which Israel broke.

The leaders of Hamas are intelligent, educated professionals, elected cleanly.

They represent for Palestinians the same yearning for clean government that Obamas does for America.

But Israel will not even talk. Ridiculous.




IT'S ANTI-SEMITIC TO BE REVULSED BY THIS?

ON AL JAZEERA'S EFFORT TO GET A LICENCE FOR THEIR NEWS SERVICE IN CANADA

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

I hope they get their licence.

I've followed Al Jazeera on the Internet, and they bend over backward to be fair and objective.

They do some good reporting.

During America's Terror in Iraq, Al Jazeera was the only source giving us objective reports of what was happening in places like Fallujah.

Their war correspondents were very brave, as they were again in the horrors of Israel's Gaza Assault.

There were definitely reports of American soldiers in Iraq targeting Al Jazeera reporters, a number being killed. Bush also, we know, wanted to bomb their broadcast building.

Folks like the Canadian Jewish Congress oppose Al Jazeera for two primary reasons.

One is the very honesty in reporting of events like Gaza that should be our main reason for wanting them here. Just as Americans in Iraq, they don't want outsiders to see the horrors they inflict.

The second reason is a dishonest argument about Al Jazeera being an outlet for terrorists and anti-Israeli radicals.

That is simply a false charge against their news service.

Al Jazeera does have another service in Arab lands on which speakers are free to voice their views, but this is kept entirely separate from the news service.

The truth is the news service is more honest and scrupulous than outfits like Fox or CNN. CNN has given utterly false reports from war zones several times. Fox is just an outlet for right-wing propaganda.

ON OBAMA'S EFFORT TO GOVERN BY CONSENSUS

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY CLIVE CROOK IN THE FINANCIAL TIMES

The political divide in America is more visceral than it is in many other places.

It always has been.

I believe it reflects not just differences of view or understanding but of basic genetic make-up.

The Puritan strain in America gives us not just a tribe of Right Wingers but a nasty contemptuous propensity found in many American political commentators and politicians.

I think it not without some truth that the good folks in America always ready to bomb some society with which they disagree and going back to supporters of the extirpation of America's First Nations and the supporters of all-out, unforgiving war in the American Civil War are of a piece with the kind of Right Wing politics we see so often in America

The Coulters, the Limbaughs, the Gingriches, the Gramms, the DeLays, etc, etc represent a genetic strain going back to the horrific diatribes of dark souls like John Knox. They were horrible people in the 16th century and their descendants still are.

In America they are sentimentalized as religious refugees in distinctive garb, munching on the first Thanksgiving dinner.

In fact, they were so obnoxious in their behavior in 16th century Europe that no one wanted them around. Many used to go to the church meetings of other groups and raise ugly disturbances, showing absolutely zero tolerance for the beliefs of others. It was mobs of Puritans who ran through the great cathedrals of England hacking up ancient sculptures, burning paintings and manuscripts, and even destroying the graves of historic figures.

Of course, the reality is that after the first Thanksgiving these charming folks busied themselves with destroying the natives who had helped them.

Nothing has changed. This curse remains unlifted.

Unfortunately, America received so many Puritans in its early days while Australia was lucky to get the criminals.




AMERICA'S VIEW OF THE PILGRIMS




WHAT THE PILGRIMS ACTUALLY LOOKED LIKE

MICHAEL IGNATIEFF AND STEPHEN HARPER ONE OF CANADA'S "MEMORABLE DUETS" ?

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY DAVID MITCHELL IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

Yes, but they form an entirely new kind of "memorable duet."

A duet of grotesques.

Harper and Ignatieff are memorable only for both being repulsive politicians.

Both have ethical issues so large, many of good conscience simply cannot consider supporting either one of them.

Harper has demonstrated time and again his acts do not in any way resemble his words, as well as complete flexibility in his principles.

Ignatieff is a member of parliament, and now leader of the Liberals, owing only to his complete lack of respect for democratic values.

Harper and Ignatieff supported the horrors and crimes of Iraq, and had either of them been PM at the time, Canada would have participated in that criminal invasion.

Ignatieff has supported "mild" torture, and no matter what he says today, that utterly disqualifies him as a decent human being.

What a miserable period ahead in Canadian politics.

One can only hope the Liberals see the truth before their convention and select someone else as permanent leader.

Ignatieff has blood on his hands: some successor to Pearson and Trudeau and Chretien.

___________

Harper and Ignatieff are both intelligent.

But the least knowledge of history will teach you that intelligence does not protect us from people who are also mad or evil or simply unethical.

Both these men feature strongly in the last category.






HARPER AND IGNATIEFF: THEY DESERVE EACH OTHER BUT WE DON'T

ISRAEL'S TRAGEDY IS ITS POLITICIANS: A FALSE THESIS

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY LIAM FOX IN THE DAILY TELEGRAPH

This makes no sense.

In a democracy, in the final analysis, you must put responsibility with the people voting and supporting its institutions.

Otherwise, all the talk of the merits of democracy is rubbish.

The people pretty much get the goverment they deserve in any democratic state.

What people fail to realize is that democracies are not automatically decent forms of government. A majority with bad intentions can indefinitely impose its will.

Only a bill or charter of rights offers some protection against such majority abuse, but Israel does not have one, nor is it likely that it ever will with religious definitions governing many aspects of its society.

It truly does not matter much who is elected in Israel.

The choice of a woman who worked with Olmert is hardly promising. He is surely a war criminal by any reasonable, meaningful definition.

Olmert launched a savage bout of killing just so his party could have election bona fides.

As to Lieberman, he is quite rightly characterized as a fascist. Were this any place but Israel, the world's press would be saying just that.

Netanyahu has a long record of inflammatory statements and corrosively negative attitudes. He is a dark, unpleasant figure, altogether.

More than once, he has openly expressed contempt for Arabs.

It is generally put that Israel has moved to the right, but I rather think it is more accurate to say that Israel has moved into darkness.

I don't know how it could be more clear that Israelis do not want a just peace.

Oh, yes, if asked about peace in general in polls, they say yes, but peace in general is a meaningless abstraction. Genuine peace has to be qualified by all the small print.

I wonder how many readers are aware that while Olmert was killing maybe 400 children in Gaza, there was heavy activity in the West Bank seizing more of other people's land?

Recent revelations through Google maps demonstrate the intensity of Israel's continuing efforts to seize land through informal settlements.

Other revelations through government papers demonstrate clearly the government's quiet collusion in such illegal and unethical efforts.

We will have peace if Israel is prepared to return to its 1967 borders, but there is not the least indication that that is likely or even possible.

But peace isn’t just borders, it is treating your neighbors with respect and decency, but we see no sign of this from Israel, and it is Israel that holds all the cards.




SOME OF ISRAEL'S HANDIWORK IN GAZA

IRAN'S REVOLUTION: ITS VIOLENCE IS CHARACTERISTIC OF ALL TRUE REVOLUTIONS AND THE ROLE OF AMERICAN POLCY IN CREATING THIS ONE

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY ROBERT FISK IN THE INDEPENDENT

But this is the story of every genuine revolution.

By genuine I'm excluding events such as the American Revolution or Britain's Glorious Revolution, important and rather violent events but only rather loosely called revolutions.

True revolutions are always explosive, violent, life-changing events. That's why we can use the word for events like the Industrial Revolution, a world-changing set of events that hurt numberless people.

Indeed, when you are familiar with the history of such events, the word revolution takes on the kind of connotations of earthquake or natural disaster.

But most political revolutions are completely avoidable. They always come out of an environment of abuse and excessive privilege and trampling on others. The signs are always there to read too, requiring only changes in policy or reforms. This was absolutely true in such revolutions as the French and the Russian.

The policies of the United States, it should be remembered, bear a great responsibility for the extremes of Iran's Revolution. It overthrew the first democratic government in the Middle East to install the bloody Shah, and they supported that vampire for years in every way they could.

He was sold what then was an amazing pile of armaments, being equipped to serve as an American surrogate in the region.

Meanwhile Savak, his secret police, pulled out the finger nails of victims and murdered thousands.

The U.S. has never stopped playing such dirty games.

It supported Hussein in his horrible war against Iran, an 8-year long horror that in terms of the proportion of population killed or hurt compares to the Great War for major European countries.

Today it supports Israel's endless threats against Iran for the sin of entering the modern age with satellites and nuclear power stations. And it says nothing of Israel's horrible abuses and of its nuclear arsenal threatening everyone in the Middle East.

ON CELEBRITY ACADEMIC, RICHARD FLORIDA, AND HIS REPORT FOR DALTON MCCGUINTY, CIRCUS RINGMASTER OF ONTARIO

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL

Already Richard Florida has become a kind of academic celebrity, and so far as I can perceive it is not owing to a wealth of original thought.

I am always keen to hear new ideas on favorite topics, but I honestly have to say I haven't heard or read one from Mr. Florida, despite a good deal of exposure.

Since coming to Toronto with fanfare, Mr. Florida has been interviewed many times of CBC Radio, sometimes at length, and he has contributed columns to the Globe.

After repeating many times why he came here, stuff about Canada's promise and opportunities - rather disingenuous, I think, since it was a plum academic appointment that brought him here - he talked at length about the late Jane Jacobs.

I was, along with so many, a great admirer of Jane Jacobs, and her classic book I devoured forty years ago. But her ideas are definitely not new and are widely known in Canada, and constantly associating yourself with her seems both a bit presumptuous and rather unpleasantly ingratiating.

One wanted to say, if you have something new to say, please, just get on with it.

Now he has written a much-advertised report for the Circus Ringmaster of Queen’s Park, Dalton the Magnificent, and I have heard him in several interviews discussing it, including one interview by the incisive Kathleen Petty with which he expressed great satisfaction.

God, I’m sorry, but he was vacuous. To make a point about today’s financial crisis and not dumping money into declining industries, he talked about people at an earlier period not stimulating agriculture but encouraging industry, the coming great sector.

Mr. Florida attributed the successful transition to the importance of the industrial sector in terms of employment in part to government’s not dumping money on an old sector.

Industry came to absorb the people leaving farms because of naturally occurring economic forces, including the industrialization of agriculture itself and increasing reductions in the demand for farm labor. The transition had nothing to do with government policies or the lack of policies. There were simply irresistible new forces at work owing to technological change.

Indeed, the fact is that today, although agriculture only now employs a small fraction of the labor force, government subsidies to agriculture remain one of the world’s great economic problems, the U.S. and the E.U. spending many tens of billions on this old sector every year.

Mr. Florida’s stuff about creativity in our economy is not new. Many names stand out from Schumpeter writing about creative destruction to Deming’s studies on continuous improvement.

Mr. Florida points to places like California and Massachusetts as centers of creative new industries, and indeed they are, but a government like Ontario’s cannot just make this happen. A major part of the reason these developments have occurred in those two places is that they each have constellations of great academic institutions attracting great minds from many places.

Boston, for example, has a half dozen major universities, at least two of which rate among the greatest in the world. You cannot just replicate that kind of intellectual infrastructure, at least not in anything less than decades of committing major resources.

And no one is going to prevent governments like Ontario’s from dumping billions in stimulus into declining industries: that is the stark reality of politics. Even a Northern Neocon like Harper has been boxed politically into spending tens of billions he did not want to spend.

Saying they shouldn’t isn’t wisdom so much as shouting against a hurricane.




RICHARD FLORIDA, SERIOUS ACADEMIC OR TENT-PREACHER PITCHMAN?