OT X is at about 150 comments – so here´s a fresh one…
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July 24, 2004
Open Thread XI
Comments
Pat,
killing innocent human beings, in my thinking, is never justified no matter there passport or nationality. I wonder how many Afghani people new about 9/11. My guess is that many did not know about it, maybe in some of the cities, but they probebly were busy enough with survival. Why should they know about the US and what happens there? Not many of them probably owned a TV and then it had mostly Taliban propaganda. Therefore, they must have wondered ‘Why does the US hate us so much’. The Afghanistan war was never justified, the Afghani people had nothing to do with 9/11, and not one of the highjackers was Afghani.
The culprits were never caught, neither OBL nor Omar (or Taliban leaders), that is if he was involved at all. There are some people here who still believe that the US government was involved too – too many security checks that failed and to many things that needed insider knowledge. I have no idea what is true – I do not believe yet we know the truths about what actually happened on 9/11. Hopefully, one day we will find out. Too little is actually know of what happened on 9/11 – OBL never admitted responsibility for 9/11, despite having done so in other attacks, however he rejoiced about it.
There is no just war, like Kate I think more on the line of Gandhi. He was an adherent of Ahimsa (one of the ten commandments of Yoga and the Vedic way of thinking, called the Yamas and Nyamas, because there are five do and five do not. Ahimsa is the first of them) or non-violence and in the end he was successful with it.
Someday, hopefully soon, the US will have to take a fresh look at itself. My guess is it will have to do what we call here the ‘Gang nach Canossa’. I read in one threads, that some of you are reading Eco’s ‘Baudolino’, which in part is also about Barbarossa. Well, Barbarossa had do go to Canossa and fall on his knees, admitting fault and begging forgiveness. I guess one of the future US Presidents will have to do something similar, maybe not Canossa and the Pope, the UN will do just fine. At then it might be helpful not only to ask for forgiveness about Iraq, but also about the Nuclear bombs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (interesting for me the first thought when I saw the pictures of 9/11 that this was what those Japanese cities must have felt like), for the Native Americans, for the Philippines, Vietnam and the interference and destructions the US has brought to many Latin American countries and so on. Other countries had to come to term with there past too. Then maybe the world can and will be able to see the other, the shiny and bright side of the US again, of which I am convinced that it exists.
Pat, sorry if I dumb this on you with out being able to respond to your answer in which I am interested, but I have to pack now and will be gone until next Monday and without internet access during the entire time.
Posted by: Fran | Jul 26 2004 7:52 utc | 101
Sorry for the errors, I was proof reading my post, but to much in a hurry – so to many errors slip my attention.
Posted by: Fran | Jul 26 2004 7:59 utc | 102
“finding” Nemo:
Thank you for words like this:
I do not know what collective amnesia washes over the mass of the American public but the peoples of the world who have suffered as a result of such ‘policies’ know them and remember them only too well for what they are.
However, I think the amnesia is more widespread or irrelevant alotgether. The policies are not even required to include an amnesia-lapse contingency, it seems. The collective “us” still believes that the rules of engagement matter while the neocon steamroll keeps rolling.
An idea I have asked to entertain here earlier on is to bypass the gruesome details of these wrongs. It is saddening to have to read about four more lives lost on paragraph 19. And yes, I feel the same way as Fran: almost surprised (and certainly nauseous) when each day brings news that is worse than the day before. Nemo: when I first saw your avalanches, I took you for an agitator. There are only so many hours in a day, and only so many articles and sources to read. I figured you were the spokesperson of a team.
So, where to go from here? How to regain sight of the forest, without becoming distracted by each single tree?
Posted by: fiumana bella | Jul 26 2004 8:27 utc | 103
Truth and honor
Australian publisher pulls controversial ‘memoir’
Publisher awaits Khouri’s reply on truth of bestseller
Book on honour killing withdrawn from sale after report calls it a ‘fake’
Bestseller on honour killing ‘is a fake’
Book could contravene fair trading act
Just as in the recent incident in France when a woman fabricated a tale of having been the victim of an anti-Semitic attack by a gang of youths, generated a storm of controversy and debate about anti-Semitism, culminating in Ariel Sharon’s appeal to French Jews to ‘escape persecution’ and settle in Israel, the story above is one that raises the question – do people want to believe horror stories about Arabs and Muslims so much that they suspend all credulity when hearing them and afford them legitimacy without any kind of fact checking? We are still living with the consequences of manufactured WMD stories and indeed many people still try to give them credibility even though by now they have been tested and found to be hopelessly deficient, devoid of any scientific or factual basis and frequently based upon the coached lies of Ahmed Chalabi’s network of drunken and fantasizing informers.
And yet there were WMD in Iraq up to the summer of 1991 and there are racist attacks in France – against Jews, against Blacks, against Muslims – and there are honor killings in some parts of the Muslim world. But does knowing that certain things exist demand that all who report them are feted as if they were champions? Does disapproval of or fear of certain things lend a gullibility to people meeting or reading those who claim to have first hand knowledge of wrongdoings? Do we embrace too quickly reports that lend support to our own beliefs or agendas? The question is significant because of the harm that uncritical acceptance of initial reports can cause.
France was convulsed with rage on first hearing of the attack that never was. The North African Arab Muslim population was placed under an even darker, suspicious cloud than usual. President Jacques Chirac expressed a sense of “dread”, Jewish and Muslim leaders condemned the attack and others said it was a horrifying example of how anti-Semitism and racism were eating away at France. Although racism is a reality the public perception was sharpened and damaged by an event that never took place.
And similarly with the concocted book on an ‘honor killing’, replete with errors about Jordanian society and life, an invented incident has caused international outcry. There are honor killings, one is too many, but why was this woman feted and lionized and her story accepted so uncritically? Was it because she came as an ‘insider’ with a tale of an aspect of a culture that Westerners do not like? You may be sure that Arab Muslimas are not too thrilled with it either but rather than improve their lot via legal and diplomatic pressure many Western observers simply seize upon such a tale as a stick to beat Islam with.
Beware Greeks bearing gifts runs an old saying. Given the WMD debacle, the Paris attack that never took place and the honor killing that seems to have sprung from the mind of a woman in search of wealth and celebrity it would seem that a willingness to accept stories because they support pre-conceived beliefs or particular agendas is as threatening to peace between peoples as are the wrongs that people wish to see righted.
Each day we live with attempts to influence our thoughts and beliefs. Often the attempts to create public moods are quite transparent at others they are more subtle altogether. There is certainly an effort being made from a number of quarters to foment a belief in an inevitable ‘clash of civilizations’ – a Holy War if you like. In the black hat is fundamentalist Islam while in the white hat is the West and its watered down yet at times fanatical Christianity. There are secularists who claim not to be wearing any hat at all and yet they usually line up with the white hat wearers when it comes to assessing the black hatted people (I am studiously avoiding reference to white bedsheet wearers as their headwear is generally not approved of).
This post is about truth, about lies, about dialogue, about mutual understanding and honor – how do we recognize them, test them, evaluate them, trust them? Because if we get it wrong then we are ramping up the negative perceptions and beliefs that we have about ‘others’ and seizing upon inflated or manufactured instances of ‘evil’ to build our distorted images. Should all ‘defectors’ carrying tales from ‘the other side’ be instantly believed? To assess the truth or otherwise of their claims requires that we seek rebuttal from ‘the other side’. How well equipped are we to evaluate the competing stories from unfamiliar cultures? How severe, in scale and impact, are the problems or injustices that are being reported? Is there confirmation from other sources?
Unfortunately there are real wrongs and injustices all over the world and when dishonest people appear claiming inside knowledge of them there seems to be a tendency to rapidly accept stories which confirm existing negative suspicions or beliefs about ‘the others’.
And meanwhile The honour killings continue
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 26 2004 8:49 utc | 104
@ fiumana bella
Hello fiumana bella. I am not, I hope, an agitator and nor am I a collective. I am just me. Apologies for the ‘avalanches’ but some are to inform, some to question and some are simply tossed into the cauldron of speculation to see what others think.
Perhaps a ‘shotgun’ approach sprays too wide and is not focused enough, perhaps I am too concerned with keeping a knowing of Iraq in peoples’ minds. Perhaps I have not yet worked out the dynamics or protocol of sites like this – I am a relative newcomer. But I am not, I say again, an agitator, and will gently return to see what has agitated you some other time.
I am curious and have a desire to describe the part of the wood that I know, as well as learn of the habitat of others. It is depressing to relate certain things I know, but each day my mind bleeds with what has befallen Iraq and perhaps this affects my focus.
We each of us have different stories to bring to the fireside and I suppose that there must be a time for lightness as well as for darker tales.
Don’t worry about me, I come in peace and curiosity, that’s all. Talk to you later.
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 26 2004 9:01 utc | 105
Incidentally, fiumana bella, if you can ever find The Arab influence in medieval Europe there is a chapter by Phillip F. Kennedy on Muslim sources of Dante? that you might find very interesting. Canto IV reveals Salah al-Din, Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd in Limbo (as Saladdin, Avicenna and Averroes), and of course Mohammed and Ali are confined within the circle of schismatics. Miguel Asin Palacios in his Escatologia Musulmana en la Divina Comedia (1919), suggests that Mohammed’s mi’raj, a related mystical ascent written by Ibn al-3arabi and a literary Divine Comedy penned in the 10th century by the Syrian philosopher-poet al-Ma3arri were influences on Dante’s work. In 1949 the work of Munòz Sendino and Enrico Cerulli (the publication of texts of La Escala de Mahoma and Il Libro della Scala, 13th century translations into French and Latin of version of the mi’raj legend) seemed to confirm the strong possibility of a direct transmission of Muslim literature from Arabic into the intellectual world of Dante. A case is made that Dante’s work is in fact not only influenced by Muslim teachings but was constructed particularly as a refutation of them.
I hope that this little tree bears fruit for you.
🙂
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 26 2004 9:31 utc | 106
No, please keep it coming…
At first is key to what I wrote. The thing is that it feels to me as if the stories just keep coming faster and faster, in larger and larger quantities. The smell of this cesspool is overwhelming.
However: although the dreadful details that emerge with every news cycle are new, the story itself is not. Maybe for me this works in a different way as for others here: I read another article and the revolting feeling in my stomach takes precedence over any cohesive ideas.
I commend you for having the strength and persistence to weed through the daily pile of dung that goes for news. What I would like to see more of is perhaps harder to describe:
* a small core of extremely wealthy persons consistently leverages the resources of millions of people for their own private benefit.
* this is achieved through lies and coercion.
* daily news is manipulated to create ambivalence, angst, and polarization of the “masses.”
* and this is and has been an accepted modus operandi for decades (centuries?)
So while misery and deaths of individuals and subgroups are thoroughly despicable and dramatic, the issue itself would not disappear by trivia like electing a new president or kicking an imperialist army out of the cradle of civilization.
This particular fireside keeps me warm, in the knowledge that I’m not alone in my worries. There is a familiarity in the shadows under the the moon of alabama.
Posted by: fiumana bella | Jul 26 2004 9:46 utc | 107
Nemo:
I’m brushing up my 13th century Tuscan, two English translations I’ve found so far seem to miss the point. Thanks for the tip, will check it out.
Posted by: fiumana bella | Jul 26 2004 9:56 utc | 108
THINGS GET COMPLICATED WHEN YOU GET PAST EIGHTEEN.
Excellent Tom Ricks Article in Pravda on the Potomac.
Strategic and Tactical Appreciations–Lessons Learned–Version 20.1
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14015-2004Jul25.html
Posted by: FLASHHARRY | Jul 26 2004 12:31 utc | 109
From Flash H’s link:
Asked Wednesday about the continuing debate over troop levels, Rumsfeld said, “There’s no magical number. There’s no formula for this.” But he went on to say at a Pentagon news conference that the Soviet Union had a large troop presence in Afghanistan during its war there in the 1980s, while the U.S. military had just “a few handfuls” in its own offensive there in the fall of 2001. “The Soviets lost and we won,” he pointedly noted.
Do reporters just sit back and inhale the stench of this guy’s bullshit?
I seem to remember a group calling itself the Taliban won in Afghanistan…
Good stuff @ vbo @ 12:46 AM
Posted by: koreyel | Jul 26 2004 13:54 utc | 110
@ Koreyl–
“I seem to remember a group calling itself the Taliban won in Afghanistan…
And therein lies the rub, right….who fueled the rise of the Taliban?….And what was the result in terms of extremism and terrorism?….which brings us back to fiumana bella’s and, perhaps, Gore Vidal’s and Lew Lapham’s ultimate question (which even Richard Clarke flirted with in his NYT OpEd on the weekend)… Is there not ample evidence that American actions are generating extremist reactions that must be dealt with by a paradigm shift in foreign policy rather than just pre-emptive ‘flexible force’ blitzkriegs?
Sorry to be self-evident, but Rumskull seems not to know what he knows but does not know (or even conceive of)…..
Posted by: RossK | Jul 26 2004 16:28 utc | 111
RossK…
I think there is ample evidence, but logical arguments don’t sway most right-wing brains.
Sometimes I get a kick out of Kevin Drum’s and Mark Kleiman’s posts for precisely this reason.
They love to show the breakdown in thinking of the Republican mind… and then challange right blogistan to be more intellectually honest.
But most folks on the right don’t care for intellectual honesty.
For example, republicans often argue for States’ rights when it suits them and against States’ rights when it suits them not.
We all know this.
Pointing out this hypocrisy again and again to them is a trivial debating game.
Because we are not, for the most, part a debating culture.
And we do not, for the most part, demand intellectual honesty in our leaders.
And most importantly of all because–(and this ties in with my post in: Not just the Right but the Duty)–Bush’s foreign policy has absolutely nothing to do with intellectual virtue–and everything to do with two of the Seven Deadly Sins: greed (oil) and Anger (9/11).
Intellectual arguments are worthless to those blinded by greed and red-eyed with revenge.
Which is not to say that the Neocon’s can’t decorate their base motives with white paper and carefully reasoned bullshit.
They can. And they do.
But only that all logical counter arguments will fail because their true motives have nothing to do with thought, and everything to do with hate for those brown gibbering savages with all that oil.
These people are anrgy hammers…and all the Moslem world looks like a nail to them.
Posted by: koreyel | Jul 26 2004 18:40 utc | 112
Meanwhile whilst Blair jets off on holidays, sacks a Government employee for speaking his mind on Panorama, is sending 25 million 16 page booklets to every home in the UK on how to deal with a terrorist attack, Rupert Murdoch on Sky One is running a new series next week called “Terror Alert”.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jul 26 2004 19:34 utc | 113
Bernhard……….. this deserves a new thread..via Juan Cole
Washington Post Weblog Contest
The Washington Post is running a contest for the best weblogs on politics this fall, including international politics. They are now taking nominations and will then do voting online. Another sign that blogging has arrived. I hope the Blogistan community will take the time to make its preferences known, now that big media is inquiring.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jul 26 2004 21:13 utc | 114
Hey hey…check it out…
Front page of the NYT right now…picture of Kerry…is that a yellow “LiveStrong” bracelet on his wrist?
Too cool.
Affirm that Lance is ours.
Anybody who is friends with Robin Williams has to be Democrat.
And anybody who thinks Austin is the best place in Texas…has to be a Democrat.
Has to be. Has to be. Has to be.
And by the way…something I didn’t see discussed anywhere online:
Why is US Postal dropping Lance after 6 incredibly successful years?
I know the reason: Because Robin Williams is friends with Lance. For repugs that is reason enough.
Don’t believe me?
Everything the bush-thugs do is political.
Everything.
Go Lance. Go Robin. Go Democrats.
[Aside: totally clueless what I am talking about? Do a search on the word “livestrong.”]
Posted by: koreyel | Jul 26 2004 21:28 utc | 115
@Koreyel
Lance Armstrong disagreed with the war on Iraq.
The only Texan to do so.
PS: Lance Armstrong, regardless of politics, is a HERO sportsman.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jul 26 2004 21:36 utc | 116
Hey CP…
Check out the left wrist of JFK…
BTW…total agreement with you on Lance.
Posted by: koreyel | Jul 26 2004 21:58 utc | 117
Some people can’t compete with Lance Armstrong, that’s for sure
Bush falls off bike again
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 26 2004 22:26 utc | 118
An American growth industry
Increased level of popular participation, increased workforce at government facilities, increased productivity and output of facilities’ products at low labor costs
Signs of prosperity?
And even without ‘affirmative action’ programs minorities are getting the lion’s share of the places!
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 26 2004 22:42 utc | 119
@Nemo:
How do you find all of this funny ####?
And why do you do it?
Are you the reincarnation of Sir Edmund Hillary–or Hilarious–or something?
I’m recruiting writers, but we’re talking “silents”.
Posted by: Harold Lloyd | Jul 26 2004 22:49 utc | 120
@ Harold Lloyd
Is that really you? Are you a joker or is your enquiry a real one? Do you believe that all my posts are #### or just some of them? You say you are interested in silents? What kind of silence are you seeking to achieve? Mine? Or you are creating a comedy perhaps? And why do I post? Why, to give you something to comment on of course and finally I have succeeded.
Should I stay or should I go?
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 26 2004 23:36 utc | 121
Well, Armstrong was just as loaded as Bush when he had to drop off from Guard duty, and that since his 1st victory. Not that he’s the first one or the last one to win a race this way, of course 😉
Posted by: Clueless Joe | Jul 27 2004 0:06 utc | 122
@Nemo:
You just amaze me I quess: your ability to keep things moving along, with your gag intros to links: and your wit. And of course I realize that Most all of what you say is deadly serious.
If you are into lyrics,satire, and the killing word, I would like to introduce you to the top-secret “Enigma Society”. We have much work to do between now and November. Does regime change in two NATO countries interest you?
This is what Enigma is all about.
If interested, please respond to my EMail address, and I’ll give you the details.
With Greatest Respect and Affection,
Posted by: Harold Lloyd | Jul 27 2004 0:16 utc | 123
Behind every fat, over-fed, gluttonous former CIA asset, ex-terrorist, Iraqi Foreign Minister is a Secretary of State-cum-Houseboy of Afro-American heritage whispering instructions
Hoshyar Zibari and his master’s voice
Aljazeera ‘outraged’ at Iraq criticism
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 1:14 utc | 124
@Nemo:
Mr. Secretary Powell has become a most pathetic
comedic parody of Step-N-Fetch-It, hasn’t he just?
Posted by: FLASHHARRY | Jul 27 2004 1:42 utc | 125
@ FLASHHARRY
It may be impolitic to say it, but it seems to me that Powell’s racial origins have been his only real career asset, that and a slavish devotion to the very system that is happy with tokenism but not real equality or justice. Perhaps many decent people would not criticize him because of fear of appearing racist, or of being judged to be too harsh on someone from a ‘minority’. His alleged ‘liberal’ instincts have been phantom qualities that people seem to have been waiting for the emergence of for many, many years now, but at every crucial moment – when such instincts, if they exist at all, should have risen up and confronted the insane direction American politics was taking – he has folded up like a broken deckchair.
Since his shameful role in the My Lai affair and at every key juncture in his political life since – his crowning glory being the final prostitution of his own soul when he delivered his masters’ United Nations WMD speech – Powell has displayed no honor and no moral basis for the positive expectations many people seemed to place in him.
His racial origins are irrelevant, he has never given a voice to America’s Blacks and has acted like the most conservative, self-serving Whitey all his Jim Crow life. Even after his media ‘humbling’ over the Iraq conflict, where legend has it that ‘decent’ Colin lost out some (probably non-existent) power struggle, he has slithered around the world doing Bush’s bidding like a hired-hand with no principles or self-respect.
As you may suppose, he don’t impress me much!
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 2:13 utc | 126
It always troubled me that a retired general was chosen to head up the nation’s diplomatic corps. That aside, I think the tip off for me about Powell’s “place” was when Dubya made the gaff about some S. American country having black people… and then said … I have people who can deal with that issue, indicating Condi and Colin. I also read a lot at The Black Commentator. There is no love lost there for Condi, and they’ve made mention of the “house slave” status of King George’s people of color.
Here’s one article from there: Rice and Powell: Bush Racial Window Dressing?
Posted by: Kate_Storm | Jul 27 2004 2:31 utc | 127
@ Kate Storm
A great site Kate, many thanks. I was pleased to see the article taking Bill Cosby to task for his rant that played into the hands of the ‘blame the victims for everything about their condition’ constituency. It is good that a site exists to nip at the heels of the hypocritical and lazy minded.
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 2:46 utc | 128
@Kate:
I beg to disagee a little:
I think Wes Clark could handle State or Defense equally. It all depends on the character and abilities of the person. NOT COLOR!
Posted by: FLASHHARRY | Jul 27 2004 2:52 utc | 129
@Kate:
Finally, my last words tonight, I think Dwight D. Eisenhower was a very good President; and I think George Catlett Marshall was extremely good as a Secretary of State. It all depends on the person.
Hopefully, BLACK COMMENTATOR has a few kind words for Thurgood Marshall, somewhere in there. too!
Posted by: FLASHHARRY | Jul 27 2004 3:07 utc | 130
It’s Tuesday, it’s 7.15am, it’s more reliable than any alarm clock….
Blasts echo across central Baghdad
Meet the new day….
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 3:15 utc | 131
One hell of a way to wake up in the morning NEMO!
Take Care All.
Posted by: FLASHHARRY | Jul 27 2004 3:27 utc | 132
Name of thieving US Air Force Major GREGORY McMILLION, charged with stealing captured AK-47 assault rifles, rocket propelled grenades, Iraqi uniforms, knives and bayonets withheld.
EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. — An Air Force major has been charged with bringing captured AK-47 assault rifles, rocket propelled grenades and other illegal war souvenirs home from Iraq to the Florida Panhandle base.
The officer’s identity is being withheld.
Panhandle Major charged with illegal Iraq war souvenirs
‘War souvenirs’? Like postcards and café teaspoons and stuff? And name withheld eh? Snigger.
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 3:38 utc | 133
Harry, Powell’s fitness for Sec. of State in my mind has nothing to do with his color. I have read some of his record dating back to Vietnam. Didn’t mean to give any other impression.
Posted by: Kate_Storm | Jul 27 2004 3:42 utc | 134
Does compulsive overeating lead to amnesia?
…After landing in Sheremetievo airport, Mr. Zibari voiced reporters his interest in having Russian soldiers on Iraqi soil. Several hours later, at the joint press conference with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Hoshiyar Zibari repudiated his words. “I”ve made no statement of this kind. We are well aware of Russia”s opinion on this issue. There are many ways in which Russia could provide Iraq with assistance. Head of Russian Foreign Ministry was flat as well, “This issue has never been on agenda, it has never been taken in consideration. We have no plans in the regard”….
Iraqi Foreign Minister failed to attract Russian troops in Iraq
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 3:50 utc | 135
Well done, George, well done
Vienna July 27 ….The Iraq war was unnecessary and ”caused more problems than it solved”, U.N. special envoy for the country Lakhdar Brahimi was quoted today as saying….
…The various groups in exile had contributed much to the present contrasts in Iraq, said Brahimi. The partition of the country into the Kurdish North, ”Sunni Triangle”, and Shia South was very recent….
….Asked whether the Iraq war had harmed the ”war on terrorism”, Brahimi said: ”The Iraq war was unnecessary. It created more problems than it solved – and it brought terrorism to Iraq.” Brahimi, who was formerly U.N. envoy for Afghanistan, warned that the country was on a dangerous course. The regional warlords had too much power and influence.
”There are presently developments similar to those events of 1992 which led the Taliban to success.” At that time, Afghans had welcomed the Taliban as liberators from the chaos and arbitrary rule of the regional warlords, said Brahimi.
Iraq war was unnecessary, says U.N. envoy Brahimi
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 4:02 utc | 136
Pentagon – CONFIRMED – Toxic chemicals from weapons programs found at fourteen current and former military bases* – grave risk to water supplies and civilian population – suspected contamination possible at up to 74 sites
Pentagon – toxic chemical contamination found at 14 bases
* in America
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 4:39 utc | 137
Nowhere Woman – a review by Zelda Bronstein
”…The moral of this story is that if women want men to do their fair share, they have to ask-make that, insist-that they do so. But such exhortation will be effective only if it is legitimated by a larger mutual commitment. For most men and women, that means the commitment of marriage, an institution that second wave feminists have generally neglected, not to say, scorned. And because marriage vows, like other promises, stand the best chance of being upheld when the pledges at hand are practicable, women need to campaign for changes in the conditions of employment that will enable working men to come through at home. A good start would be to demand shorter and more flexible hours across the board for both men and women. Whatever the specifics, family life needs to be given its due…”
Global Woman : Nannies, Maids, and Sex Workers in the New Economy edited by Arlie Russell Hochschild and Barbara Ehrenreich
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 6:40 utc | 138
Breaking news
Breaking news of an emergency on an Australian airplane – accounts of a failed attempt to break into the cockpit and an emergency landing. No links found yet.
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 7:58 utc | 139
Sydney – Los Angeles flight alert
…United Airlines Flight UA840 carrying 246 people was bound for Los Angeles but turned back to Sydney as a precautionary measure about 90 minutes after take-off, a United Airlines spokesman said….
United flight lands in Sydney after cockpit alert
Unclear yet whether this was a false alarm, instrument malfunction, bomb alert or actual attempt by a person or persons to gain access to the cockpit.
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 8:34 utc | 140
Freed Egyptian diplomat back at work, Iraqi garbage collector killed by early morning mortar attack as he worked, 14 soldiers injured by mortars, assistant director of Mahmoudiya Hospital assassinated on way home from work…
Iraq – hard work and it’s still only eight minutes to lunch time
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 27 2004 8:52 utc | 141
Just read somewhere that 25% of the worlds prisoners are in the US. The next piece said the US is using 25% of the worlds energy. All this with some 4% of the worlds inhabitants. Is there a relation?
Posted by: Bernhard | Jul 27 2004 10:24 utc | 142
Sydney – Los Angeles flight alert
Looks like they found a note in toilet that there is a bomb on the plane…But there was nothing there later when they inspected back in Sydney…so most likely it was a false alarm…but did it’s job…
They are telling us EVERY DAY here on TV how terrorist are after us in many different ways and today I suppose whole nation lost it’s appetite cause there is a treat (they say) that terrorist will poison our food…Hunger strike anyone?
Posted by: vbo | Jul 27 2004 14:05 utc | 143
Hi Harold, are we out of synch? I’ll try to be in and out as the morning breaks.
Posted by: Nemo | Jul 28 2004 0:42 utc | 145
Well Nemo,
Let’s always remember that the mordant pen is more deadly than the scimitar. Much impressed by the “Clash Lyrics” you linked to. The really effective way to eliminate the Bush-NeoClown rabble is to get the whole world laughing real loud at them.
Scenario I: the great Ottoman conqueror, Abaziad I, with 150,000 janisarries, is leaving Baghdad, to conquer the evil land of Vlad the Impaler(Iran). Rock the Casbah gives him pause.
Scenario II: Alexander the Great(GW) is having trouble with his latest squeeze, Ms. Iraq.
She poses the ultimate question: “Should I Stay or Should I Go?”
Just Poetic thoughts, Nemo. Think about what you could contribute poetically.
I’m working real hard on Scenario III.
Look forward to your initial thoughts tomorrow.
Posted by: Harold Lloyd | Jul 28 2004 2:36 utc | 146