Why no ‘Al vs. the Volcano’?

I think it’s interesting that for all of the news reports about disruptions in air travel due to the Icelandic volcano, I haven’t seen many (any) articles talking about the environmental impact of the volcano’s eruption. You’d think that with all the concern about global warming, and the approach of Earth Day, we’d’ve been just as worried about the effects of a volcano constantly spewing God-only-knows how many greenhouse gases (more than many countries spew in a year, I’d bet) into the atmosphere every hour as we would be about the effects of ash clouds on plane engines, right? I guess not, but if so, that’s a bit stupid of us, don’t ya think?

I mean, shouldn’t Al Gore be on Eyjafjallajokull’s case like he is on ours? We’re talking about a repeat-offender, remember. Back in the 1820s, an eruption of the volcano at Eyjafjallajokull lasted for over a year. At this point, it doesn’t seem as if this eruption will last as long, but even so…why is Al giving this volcano the benefit of the doubt? It has already damaged the environment in the past…a year-long eruption, people! And thousands of lives were lost in Britain due to that aforementioned incident. We’re just gonna give a pass for that?

We should at least be calling on Iceland to immediately cease and desist from pumping all these toxins into the atmosphere, shouldn’t we? But then again, this begs the question…should Iceland be held accountable for the actions of one volcano on its soil? Well, let’s see…maybe not. Maybe this volcano has done us all a favor, and just in time for Earth Day. How so? I think it goes without saying that everyone’s “carbon footprint” calculations are useless at the moment, since there’s no way we’ll *ever* be able to match Eyjafjallajokull’s output.

So in that sense, there’s one less thing to worry about. Of course, if we see a global temperature spike in the next few months, or even the next year, we’ll know who to blame. Or maybe…who to credit? After all, if humanity can pin even some blame for climate change on Eyjafjallajokull, that’s a BIG weight off our shoulders. Maybe we should buy Iceland a present?

Ah, but then…then we have to figure Al Gore into the equation. And Mr. Gore isn’t as likely to let us off the hook as he is Eyjafjallajokull. Which means that over the course of the next year, global temperatures might rise because of Iceland’s volcano, but we can’t expect Al Gore to acknowledge it. All of humanity will, in effect, remain “the Jews,” the easy scapegoat for the planet’s environmental ills. Heck, we may end up hearing more about the beneficial environmental effects stemming from a days-long airline industry shutdown than we do about the adverse environmental effects due to a days-long volcanic eruption in Iceland.

So I say, let’s hold Iceland and/or Eyjafjallajokull accountable while we can…but that’s just me.

Happy Earth Day.

Turned On the Faucet. This Came Out.

It’s funny. What’s funny? I don’t know. That’s just the first thing that popped into my head. I was wondering what to write, somewhat concerned that nothing was coming to mind, and then…it’s funny. That’s what popped into my head. Come to think of it, I just repeated myself. I said popped into my head twice. Why did that happen? How did it happen? Oh, shit. Does it really matter one way or the other, why or how? Is it going to affect my future, wondering about that? I don’t know. Which is why determining the worthiness of spending time wondering about it is either much or little, depending on the moment. Depending on the moment. Shouldn’t it be depending on the moments? No, probably not. Moment to moment, that’s what it depends on. There’s no need to pluralize that which needn’t be so.

Needn’t be so. That sounds somewhat archaic. I read too many older things, maybe. Too much or too little, because the writing today often pales in comparison to what was written in the past. Take Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s work about the Great Boer War. I spent about 20 minutes today perusing that on my Kindle for Mac, and the only thing that caused me to cease my reading was…well, my memory is fuzzy on just what it was that inspired me to stop. It could have been hunger, or thirst, or a need to pee. Hell, it could have even been a hard-on. I’m not really sure. And the funny thing is…heh, it’s funny…that at the time of this writing, the moment – oh, there’s a connection – I speak of took place just a short time ago. Just a few hours, ago. Why did I put that comma there? Fuck if I know. I don’t know myself half as well as I think.

Anyway, what was I saying? I digress. No, I wasn’t saying that. I digressed, that’s it. So anyway, I was reading the author of Sherlock Holmes’ work about South Africa. I bought it months and months ago, while I was still in Coree du Sud. Wait, why the fuck did I just write South Korea in French? What purpose does that serve? What does it add to the narrative. Wait, is this a narrative? Wait, why the hell am I saying wait so much? Okay, back to the story. Doyle’s words regarding the failings of British policy in southern Africa don’t read like a modern history narrative. They might as well be a novel, for the way that they collectively enrapture me, instill in me a desire to keep on reading until something or other – again, I can’t remember what – distracts me enough that I decide to pull myself away from the book and abandon it for a while.

Distractions. They’re interesting, aren’t they? Of course they are, otherwise they wouldn’t distract us to begin with. They wouldn’t command our attention. Mind you, when I started writing this bit about distractions, I was meaning in the more general sense that they are interesting. The very act of being distracted isn’t so strange, but that we get upset about it. We’re told we need to focus, focus, focus, keep our eyes on the prize, maintain our trek toward whatever the goal may be. But like I said, distractions are interesting. And perhaps even more interesting is what it is that distracts us, as I said before. I, for one, am particularly distracted by a woman’s pretty face, or – as is just as often the case – the bust situated just beneath it. I can’t be honest? You want me to say a woman’s face is all I look at?

But see, just there I was distracted. I wasn’t thinking about me, but about you. What do I care what you think, about what distracts me? The saying might be, judge not lest ye be judged, but we all do it anyway, and file an appeal…at least, in our minds we do. We know, or think we know, when we’re being judged, and we rush to defend ourselves. Why? How well do those who are judging us know us? Not that well. So when I write about how cleavage manages to distract me even in a bookstore – where not much besides is able to easily disrupt my attention – there’s a part of me that knows that whoever is reading this has suddenly come to certain conclusions about me that may or may not be accurate. They certainly aren’t the whole story, those conclusions. So why do we care so much that they’re being made?

Alright, enough of that. I’m not a philosopher, I don’t need to try to answer questions others who believe they are philosophers spend plenty of time worrying about on their own. I think for myself, of course, but ultimately the bigger questions about why we worry about what we worry about don’t affect me all that much. The questions don’t get in my way when I’m reading a book. They don’t normally bother me when I’m watching TV. They stay out of my line-of-sight when I’m wandering around a tourist attraction. Obviously, they pop into my head – there it is again – when I’m writing, but that’s what happens when you lift off the bridle of the mind and just run with it. Thoughts you’d rather not have but aren’t ashamed to have force their way into your consciousness, and if you’re in the process of writing, they’re added to the evidence.

The evidence of what? The evidence of the writing, of course. The tangible, readable shapes you now see before you. They are evidence that, one way or another, I have been thinking. Maybe I haven’t been thinking all that profoundly, but then, who needs to think profoundly except those who believe they have to think profoundly? My reputation – such as it is – doesn’t depend on any such notion. I could think about banal, vulgar things, and then write about them, for days on end. Well, not literally for days on end. I’d need to sleep, eat, shower, brush my teeth, masturbate, drink water, drink juice, drink beer, etc. And when you get right down to it, I probably wouldn’t be able to keep up the banal thread for long. Sooner or later, I’d involuntarily try my hand at profundity again, realize I don’t need to, and then write about it all.

What in that last paragraph, that preceding collection of words combined into sentences, sticks out at you right now? Don’t think too much about it. Just think, and say. Well, think it, at least, ’cause I can’t hear you and if you’re talking out loud to yourself there’s a good chance you’ll have some explaining to do later. As for me, what sticks out is…well, fuck. I don’t know. I’m not sure what there is to remember in that last paragraph, whether there’s anything in there that I should be remembering more than any other thing accompanying any other thing. I just kind of repeated myself, but I don’t care and didn’t mean to do it. I, well…fuck it. I actually want to talk about something else, but damned if I can think of what. I’m not in command of this process. It’s just happening, flowing freely, like the Nile, the Jordan, the Han. Rivers.

Rivers! That’s what I can talk about. I can talk about the rivers I’ve seen. Such as the Mississippi, and the Nile, and the Jordan, and the Han, and the Yarkon, and the…well, there was a really dirty river in Daegu, Korea, but I can’t remember the name of it at the moment. It was really dirty, as I recall from research the dirtiest in Korea, but…what does it matter? I’m talking about a river. Or rivers. Say, is it redundant to speak of multiple rivers? Does it matter, in the greater scheme of things? It sounds weird, to say there are multiple rivers on our planet. Shouldn’t it be enough to just say, there are rivers on our planet? Doesn’t that speak for itself, the plural of river? Obviously, if there is more than one river, there are rivers. It stands to reason that if there are rivers, they aren’t just found in one spot, but many. Hence the plural. Rivers.

Okay, time to write about something else. How about this: Writing. Am I writing right now? There are many books about writing and being a writer. But am I writing? No. I’m typing. I’m the author of this, yes, and it could be said that I authored it and whoever said it wouldn’t be wrong. But, as I said, did I write all of this, pen in hand, paper in front of me? No. If I’m being literal, practical, then I can’t say that what this is is writing. It’s typing. On a MacBook Air in a cafe at a Barnes & Noble in Tucson, Arizona, USA on March 31, 2010 at 8:26:26 p.m., or 20:26:39 if you’re in the military or in a country other than the United States of America. Shit, digressed again. Writing. Erm, typing. These words have not been written, not in the traditional sense. Not in the literal sense. So why do we call people who type books, writers?

Declaration of the Sheeple’s Republic of Facebook

WHEN in the course of human Events, it becomes necessary for millions of People to dissolve the Emotional and Intellectual Bands which have connected them with each other, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which they feel the Laws of Human Nature, the Internet, “Jersey Shore” and “American Idol” entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation from Reality.

WE hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Humans are created equal (but some Humans are more equal than others), that they are endowed by their Creator(s) and/or Society with certain unalienable Rights, that probably absent among these are Respect, Decency, Humility and the pursuit of Distinctiveness…That, to secure against these non-Rights, Online Social Networks are instituted among Men and Women, deriving their just and assumed Powers from the consent contained within User Agreements and/or Privacy Settings…That whenever any Form of Social Convention becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of these People-cum-Sheeple to alter or abolish information on their Profiles, and to upload a new Image, laying its Foundations on such Principles, and organizing their Profiles in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect a desired emotional response in others.

THEREFORE,

WE the Sheeple of Facebook, in Order to form a more contrived Reputation, establish Laziness, insure widespread Superficiality, provide for the common Pretense, promote the general “Who Cares?”, and secure the Blessings of Mediocrity and/or Mundanity to ourselves and all Humanity, do ordain and establish our Penchant for Copycatting the Status Updates of others without recourse to Reason; Changing our Profile Pictures to show celebrities whom we resemble but who don’t know we exist; Joining “For every member who joins we’ll donate $0.01 to Haiti” groups in lieu of donating actual money ourselves; Adding “Friends” we don’t actually know for the sake of doing so; And for persisting with other Similar yet no less Debasing activities and then sharing them online with Everyone.

ACCORDINGLY, appealing to Ourselves for the Rectitude of our Intentions, we do (in the Name, and by the Authority of the good Sheeple of these Profiles) solemnly Publish and Declare, That We (these United Sheeples) are, and of Right ought to be, in Enslaved and Dependent States of Mind; that being in them we are absolved from all Allegiance or Deference to Common Sense, and that any literal Connection between us and the State of Reason, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as we are Enslaved and Dependent, others have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent People may of right do, and that we may then act as if We Give A Shit and Know It All.

AND FOR the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of Mark Zuckerburg, Lady Gaga & His Serene Awesomeness Barack Hussein Obama II, we mutually pledge to each other the sacrifice of our Privacy, our Dignity, and our sacred Honor.

Signed,

The Representatives of the Sheeple’s Republic of Facebook, in Profiles Assembled

As We Head Toward the Head of the Year

Lately, I’ve come to realize that I haven’t been nearly as introspective as I should be, considering the circumstances of my life at present. I’ve little, overall, to complain about…and I don’t intend this to be an airing of grievances. That being said, the approach of the expiration of my current teaching contract in Korea at the end of this October, and the approach of the new Jewish year at the end of this week, provide enough justification to spur a man on to far more rumination than I’ve allowed myself.

Perhaps it’s understandable, given recent events.

On September 4, a Friday, I’d awoken expecting my longest teaching day of the week. Instead, a short time after arriving at work that day, my co-teachers and I were informed that one of our students had come down with swine influenza, and that we wouldn’t be teaching until the Wednesday of the following week at the earliest. That whole week, I’d occasionally noticed myself absentmindedly playing with loose change remaining from a trip to Kyoto, Japan, I’d taken in August. I suddenly had a yen to spend that extra yen…

And so, after briefly considering taking a trip instead to Jeju Island – South Korea’s southernmost possession – that evening I booked a trip to Fukuoka, Japan, flying out of Busan, Korea the next morning. Appearances to the contrary, such spur of the moment decisions are rare – previously, there had been only the cross-country Greyhound bus trip from Tucson to NYC I’d taken in the summer of ’01, an impulsive French vacation from Israel in September ’04, and my sudden return to Arizona from the East Coast in November ’07.

Life is funny like that – a situation, or opportunity, never previously entertained suddenly drops into your lap without so much as a warning. One minute, you’re  melancholy, thinking about what you probably won’t be doing this weekend, and the next, you’re euphoric, imagining everything you could be – will be – doing instead. Such was the predominant theme of September 5~8, 2009; life’s ability to take us by surprise was profoundly demonstrated at the memorials I visited in Hiroshima (09/06/09) and Nagasaki (09/07/09).

Upon my return to Korea on the 8th, a Tuesday, I received an e-mail from a language institute in Seoul I’d been interviewing with. Again, I found myself face-to-face with a sudden possible change in assumed plans: If I were to be offered, and accepted, the job being pursued, rather than enjoy a month or two back home in America following a yearlong sojourn in South Korea, I’d head up to Seoul from Daegu the weekend my old contract at one academy ended, so as to start the next Monday a new contract at a different academy.

The morning of that Wednesday, the 9th, I had an enjoyable phone interview with the Seoul institute’s Academic Director, an enjoyable interview that went quite well. It seemed life was finding a way to make things interesting – and complicated – again. And for the most part, in an agreeable way. But…

But…I felt I was being backed into a corner. This was a mistake, as subsequent conversations with my Dad helped me to realize: I wasn’t being forced into a corner involuntarily; I was allowing myself to be led into it. I should have been able to realize this on my own, since just before I’d flown to Japan a second time, I’d come across a wonderful quote, which I then adopted as the ultimate underlying theme (or more accurately, mantra) of each day of that unanticipated trip: Either you run the day or the day runs you.

Those words, and my Dad’s counsel, grounded the semi-chaotic electrical impulses of my brain; I remembered I have several reasons to look forward to returning to the United States, for however long I’m there. I soon realized that in considering taking the job (if it were offered, on the terms it would be offered), I wasn’t really thinking about the future, so much as leaping without doing much in the way of looking into what…something that I often am more than willing to accuse the Koreans, amongst whom I live, of doing way too much.

At the very least, this realization helped me decide that, if the job in Seoul is offered, I am nevertheless bound and determined to follow through with my original plan of spending much-wanted and much-needed time with family, friends and familiar sights in the Obamanited States of America. And if this means I need to look for another job instead, in Seoul or elsewhere, I will. Because it isn’t just the case that Either you run the day or the day runs you; it’s also, Either you run your life or Life runs you.

Which, finally, brings me back to where I began this: Noting that lately, I really haven’t been thinking properly – and when I say “properly”, I mean “commonsensically” and “logically” – about my future.

This past year – here I refer to both 5769 and 2009 – has, overall, been an unparalleled roller-coaster of emotions…mostly good, amazing, insightful and positive, thank the Maker, but also challenging, complicated, conflicted and, yes, at times extremely saddening, lonely and depressing as well. Up until recently, I’d come to take this emotional roller-coaster so much for granted that I’d come to believe that taking a break from it would be the more perilous prospect than staying on for a little while longer. No longer is this the case.

What Ferris Bueller said is true, though to be honest, I’d never really effectively internalized these immortal words until now: “Life moves pretty fast…if you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”

This past year has challenged – and, thus, altered – me, my life and my assumptions about my future and its possibilities far more than I ever expected it to; while not even a full year (10.5 months, to be exact) has elapsed since I first landed as an English teacher in Korea, I’ve changed – undeniably, for the better – far more than I did over the course of several years spent in Israel after college. What, then, to make of such empirical data? What am I going to do with myself next, aside from teaching another year…and hey, where will I go?

Well, as I’ve been telling many of my young Korean students a lot recently (it’s also a phrase they now mockingly repeat in my face, en masse, after they’ve asked me, en masse, to check every individual class book and/or workbook at once): “Hang on! Hang on!“. Let me get off this roller-coaster first, before I tell you which ride I’ll be heading toward next. And please, don’t expect me to do much more than enjoy myself as I wait in line for whichever one it ends up being…for God only knows how long securing my next teacher’s visa will take.

And on that note: Whether you’re a Jew or a Gentile (or something in between, or something completely different, or even…gosh!…a liberal), allow me now – from the Republic of Korea – to extend heartfelt wishes to you – wherever you are – for a good, healthy, peaceful, prosperous and sweet 5770, full of blessings, gratitude, love…and all that jazz. Shanah tovah u’metukah.

שנה טובה ומתוקה

Wake Up and Smell the Lox…This Ain’t Kosher!

Speaking as an American Jew, a conservative and an Israeli, the following video (below all the text) insults my intelligence.

The woman in question, Pamela Pilger, yelled “Heil Hitler!” at Samuel Blum. Mr. Blum is an Israeli who has lived in the United States for 21 years. Much is being made of this confrontation – conveniently picked up by Las Vegas TV – on YouTube, but what people who are commenting on it are failing to notice most of the time is that Ms. Pilger is wearing an Israeli Army shirt.

Yes, that’s right:

When the camera pans over to her, you can clearly see she’s wearing an “Israel Defence Forces” shirt. Most folks might miss it (and her earrings, which are – surprise, surprise – crosses). Whoever staged this event – and by “event”, I mean the video – at KLAS must not have done their research, because as I will point out again later, you don’t usually visit Israel – or buy such a shirt in a souvenir shop and then wear it – if you’re an anti-Semite.

You may or may not have heard that polls show support is flagging amongst American Jews for Obama’s Mideast policies. It’s still strong for him in other areas, but not that one. “So what?” you might say. Well, the way I see it, someone could be attempting to bolster Jewish support for this particular issue – health-care reform – by portraying Obama’s opponents as bigots. After all, if support for your policies is waning on one front, it’s possibly eroding elsewhere. Best to cover all your bases.

Don’t think it’s possible? Well, go to YouTube, read the comments for yourself, and you’ll see that there are plenty of useful idiots who would buy into such a ploy. What’s more, for all of the hatred one generally intends to be imparted to another when those two little words, Heil and Hitler, are combined these days, it is remarkable – when reading the aforementioned YouTube comments – to see so much…hatred for conservatives on display as a direct result of this video. Ironic, isn’t it?

As for the woman, Pamela Pilger, there are many people posting her contact information on YouTube. One person said to me, after I was the first to point out that something about the video “ain’t kosher“, that “You can easily find out online that she and her husband were McCain/Palin supporters.” This same person continued, “It really isn’t a stretch to think that the ignorant lady doesn’t realize screaming ‘Heil Hitler’ to an Israeli Jew is a bad idea.”

But the problem is, that it really is something of a stretch to think such a thing. At least, for me it is.

See, Israeli Army souvenir shirts aren’t just sold everywhere. And you don’t generally visit Israel, or buy or wear such a shirt, whilst being (or remaining) ignorant about the relationship between Jews and “Heil Hitler!”. In any case, whether you’ve been to Israel or not, and whether you’re Jewish, Gentile, a philo-Semite, an anti-Semite, college educated or a beauty-school dropout, you probably know “Heil Hitler!” is not something said by people who are ignorant of its probable emotional impact on a Jew.

Am I blowing this out of proportion? Is my imagination running wild? Isn’t it just possible or likely that the confrontation in this video is legit, and represents a unique display of an ignorant form of anti-Semitism by a “known” conservative who has been to Israel and opposes President Obama’s liberal agenda?

If so, then I’d have to say it was also mighty convenient that Pamela Pilger – sporting an Israeli Army shirt and cross earrings – happened to be standing right where she was (so close to the camera), and that she said what she said within earshot of Samuel Blum (Jew and yored), as he was being interviewed by KLAS at a so-called “town hall” in Las Vegas. Mighty convenient, yep: She’d been interviewed earlier, and thus were established her conservative credentials.

I’m telling you, something about this just doesn’t sit right with me. It smells fishy. But not like thinly-sliced cured salmon on a bagel with cream cheese.

Of Rights and Rules

“You have all these rules, and you think they’ll save you…” – Joker (Heath Ledger) to Batman (Christian Bale) in The Dark Knight

*

The current furor over “waterboarding” and the use of torture-like methods to interrogate terrorism suspects is not, as some might suspect, about whether or not an America whose Government has in the past sanctioned the use of “waterboarding” has moved away from our ideals and principles. No, this – though those who are calling for prosecution of those involved might loudly disagree, in shock that their true motives have been unclothed – this is about the rights of terror suspects, indeed all who are suspected, or guilty, of breaking the law.

How can I say this? Well, for one, if this were about America remaining “true to itself”, then we’d be hearing a lot more not only about torture, but the past and current support given by the United States’ Government to undemocratic regimes for the sake of regional stability, or because they were anti-Soviet, anti-Communist or, today, anti-Al-Qaeda/anti-Islamist. We’d also, in the same discussion, hear a lot more negative buzz regarding Barack Obama’s handshake with Hugo Chavez, a man who is overtly intent on remaking Venezuela into something much less than a democracy.

If this “torture debate” were about America not living up to the creeds of its Founders, we’d also be discussing – at length – slavery, segregation and even poverty. How long were some men held in bondage, after the signing of a Declaration of Independence which argued that all men are created equal? And if – as Jefferson noted – all men were created equal, why, in many part of the United States, were some men, for some time, considered more equal than others? If all men were created equal, there should never have been a need for separate bathrooms or water fountains for whites and blacks.

But we’re not hearing such matters being discussed in the same breath, or even in the same articles, about torture, are we? If it’s the soul of America that’s at stake over this matter, you would think we’d just be laying it all bare, right now. We’d be seeking to get our collective and individual sins off our chests, so that we might embrace the spirit of the Declaration and Constitution anew, with a commitment to trying to live up to the standards set out for us by the Founders. There’d be apologies for slavery, apologies to Native Americans, just as in the past there were to ethnic Japanese held during WWII.

Alas, such is not the case: We hear about who knew what, when, and how much they knew. We hear about the possibility of prosecutions. We read about the memos. It’s all politics, though. It’s the Democrats, their power growing with each vote count accepted and/or discarded in Minnesota, and of course the defection of Arlen Specter. What this is, is nothing more than a witch hunt. It’s not about whether it was right or wrong to torture people who deserve to be tortured. It’s about vindictiveness towards those who carried out policies which, like ’em or not, prevented another terror attack on the U.S.A.

Oh, you forgot about that part, right? How many major terrorist atrocities have been carried out in the United States since, say, September 12, 2001? Right now our main problem is rebuilding ourselves the buildings which were knocked down by others, by terrorists. We thankfully have not had to worry about searching for the dead amongst the rubble of other buildings felled by Islamists. Americans are able, for the most part, to enjoy the relative safety still afforded by two broad oceans, though it’s tenuous safety, as there’s no telling how many carriers of H1N1 snuck north over the border last night.

If we had to waterboard some very bad people, who don’t fear death, and thus can’t be persuaded by normal threats, to tell us about plans for future terror attacks, or divulge where those who have already planned or financed terrorist attacks are hiding, then I say, great. Innocent lives were saved. Don’t forget our enemy: Just the fact of still being alive, for these guys, is often torture enough.

Were they to die from waterboarding, and other terrorists found out, they who died would be seen as martyrs. Is it torture? If we go by normal rules of right and wrong, then yes, it’s torture. But we’re not dealing with, or talking about, people who respect the “normal” rules of right and wrong…whether we’re talking about regular jihadis, or pirates attacking civilian and merchant liners off Somalia. They don’t feel bound by the laws of any given country or society. They’re their own lawmakers. Law of the gun.

Was it right to use waterboarding? If the technique was used primarily just for kicks, to get our vindictive ya-ya’s out, then I would say no. Then it would have been a mistake; then it would necessitate hearings and such. But if useful intel was gained from terrorists by waterboarding, or other methods, if useful intel was gained by such methods from those who would otherwise have remained closed-mouthed despite every other method of persuasion, and American lives were saved, then I say let’s be shocked not that we resorted to such methods, but that we face people who leave us no choice but to seriously consider using them.

*

“You have nothing…nothing to threaten me with!”– Joker (Heath Ledger) to Batman (Christian Bale) in The Dark Knight

*

Yes, our Islamist enemies are human beings. But they often don’t see us as such. They view me, for example, as the offspring of pigs and monkeys. To say that it’s “wrong” to “torture” such people, who don’t fear death and love bringing it to others…well…we haven’t been fighting nice, decent people. Those who back them aren’t, generally, nice decent individuals or regimes. They’re usually intent on sowing chaos and reaping the benefits. They hold us hostage not only individually, the traditional way, but also by their guns, their rockets, and, God forbid, they’ll do so with their nuclear weapons, too, should they ever get their hands on them.

I think, by the way, that torture is wrong. Torture for torture’s sake, especially, is wrong. But I also think it’s wrong for those who argue that there’s no absolute standard for distinguishing what’s right from what’s wrong, to say that waterboarding these sorts is wrong. You ask me, it’s the same as denouncing President Bush for being an evil genius in one breath, and joking about his utter doofus-y ineptitude the next. For us not to consider the reality it is of who we’ve been dealing with is unconscionable. We’re not fighting the Muppet Babies.

Sometimes, facing an enemy who doesn’t respect your rules or who seeks to use your own rules to hamper your ability to fight them effectively…you have to bend or break your own rules. It’s a constant battle within ourselves, and our society.

*

“Nothing to do, with all your strength!” – Joker (Heath Ledger) to Batman (Christian Bale) in The Dark Knight

*

Which is why “The Dark Knight” was as awesome, and timely, a movie as it was. In the movie, Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman) knew it was inherently wrong to listen in on the phone calls of millions upon millions of Gothamites. But Batman (Christian Bale), while also knowing this, also knew that listening in on the phone calls, and using them to triangulate the Joker’s position, was the only way to stop such a self-professed “agent of chaos” from committing acts of mass murder.

And in the end, with the Joker having successfully been caught, Lucius Fox finds his ultimate faith in Batman/Bruce Wayne vindicated when he puts his name in the phone-tracking machine and it shuts itself down, permanently.

We, too, in the real world, have ways of shutting down a method that might have been effective in helping us win our fights against a ruthless enemy, but shouldn’t last or be used for too long, for fear of its being abused. Such is the case with waterboarding. It outlived its usefulness, however/if ever useful it was, and now we should be looking at the future. We should not, however, be overly concerned with expanding the rights of those who stand accused of terrorist acts, who were/are often…caught in the act.

We need a Government that worries more about the welfare of the American people than the welfare of those who are trying to kill American soldiers and civilians. Unfortunately, I don’t believe we have such a Government, under the current Administration.

***

The Dark Knight (2008) – Interrogation Scene (takes a minute to load)

No Other Form of Hatred

“Thanks to Hitler, of blessed memory, who on behalf of the Palestinians revenged in advance against the most vile criminals on the face of the earth. Although we do have a complaint against him, for his revenge on them was not enough.”

– Ahmad Ragab, columnist for Al-Akhbar (Egypt), writing on April 18, 2001

******

On this Yom HaShoah, I hereby dedicate this entry to the memory of the six million Jews who died in the Holocaust…victims of a hatred which refuses to die.

– J.S. Slavin

******

Show me a form of hatred which can equal anti-Semitism. The sad fact of the matter is, no other form of hatred has ever sentenced so many to death for an uncommitted crime. No other form of hatred has ever provided the foundation for so widespread a systematic slaughter of human beings. No other form of hatred has anti-Semitism’s longevity. No other form of hatred has ever been harnessed to bring about such profound human depravity.

No other form of hatred has as many apologists for it as anti-Semitism. No other form of hatred can gather about itself the cloak of legitimacy as anti-Semitism can. No other form of hatred has been as successful as anti-Semitism at creating what Sartre called “an elite of the ordinary.” No other form of hatred matches the virulence and passion of anti-Semitism. No other form of hatred masquerades as mere “criticism” as the world allows anti-Semitism to.

No other form of hatred should have recovered from such an event as the Holocaust, as anti-Semitism has…and yet, anti-Semitism didn’t die along with the 1.4 million Jews who perished at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Anti-Semitism has persevered in spite of Belzec, and it has outlived Bergen-Belsen, Chelmno, Sobibor and Buchenwald. Over 800,000 Jews met their deaths at Treblinka, yet anti-Semitism, stubborn stalwart that it is, survives them still today.

Yes, anti-Semitism is alive and well, as any glance at the periodicals found at a Saudi or Egyptian newsstand can tell you (and as I once saw for myself in a Cairo hotel bookshop). Anti-Semitism, combined with Islamist doctrine and Arab nationalism, provides the fuel not only for the rhetoric of Hamas and Hizballah, but for their rockets as well. And in Geneva, Switzerland this week, anti-Semitism shall once again receive a subtle stamp of approval…

…at an anti-racism conference, of all things!

Jean-Paul Sartre, in Anti-Semite and Jew, felt that “The anti-Semite has chosen hate because hate is a faith…He is a coward who does not want to admit his cowardice to himself…In espousing anti-Semitism, he does not simply adopt an opinion, he chooses himself as a person.” The same is true of any racist, but as even Adolf Hitler admitted, “…in reality and from the genetic point of view there is no such thing as the Jewish race.”

So…why is it that anti-Semitism is permitted not merely to endure, but flourish? Why the resurgence in hatred of the Jew and things Jewish since the Holocaust? It would be facile of you – and, I daresay, a shade anti-Semitic – to point the finger at Israel alone, for such a view scapegoats the Jew for Jew-hatred. Plus, it ignores the pogroms which occurred in Europe after the concentration and death camps had been liberated, prior to Israel’s birth in May ’48.

No less a figure than Hitler himself observed, in his “Political Testament” (written February 1945), that, “Before the opposition to it can disappear, the malady itself must disappear. And from that point of view, you can rely on the Jews: as long as they survive, anti-Semitism will never fade.”

And so on this Holocaust Remembrance Day, I dare you to show me another form of hatred, a malady anti-Semitism’s equal or “better”, whose Final Solution – whose cure – was spelled out and attempted to be administered on a scale to match Hitler’s Judenfrei/Judenrein vision: “Under the guidance of the Reich, Europe would speedily have become unified. Once the Jewish poison had been eradicated, unification would have been an easy matter.”

Um, yeah…

There is no other form of hatred like anti-Semitism. You know it. I know it. Hitler knew it.

You’ll fail.

*******

“This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre, which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades.”

– Arab League Secretary-General Azzam Pasha, on the war against Israel; May 15, 1948

A Prayer for Passover, 5769/2009

Once we were slaves in Egypt; now there are slaves in North Korea. Passover is a celebration of freedom, yet just a few hours north of where I am living, there are 150,000-200,000 people living in concentration camps. Passover commemorates the breaking of the bonds of Jewish slaves in ancient Egypt, and yet today, 22-23 million Koreans are enslaved under an abominable modern regime on the Korean Peninsula, with no hope or knowledge of any “Moses” (모세) who might deliver them from bondage.

According to state-run media in Pyongyang, Kim Jong-il, their ruthless dictator, “felt regret for not being able to spend more money on the people’s livelihoods and was choked with sobs,” as North Korea launched a long-range rocket this past Sunday.

We who are lucky to be where we are and who we are, we whose heritage it is to “…explain to your son on that day, ‘It is because of what the Lord did for me, when I went forth from Egypt,’” (Exodus 13:8), and even those whose heritage it is not, should be choked with sobs that Kim Jong-il’s people have such a leader as he. It is our duty, indeed it is the duty of all freedom-loving people, whatever their creed be, to oppose such a monstrous application of human power. “Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God,” said Thomas Jefferson.

It is reasonable to assert that Moses (משה) felt the same.

.חג שמח. לשנה הבאה בירושלים…וב…פיונגיאנג

Of Rockets and Tyrants

“I am afraid that if we fail to restrain this madman sooner rather than later, the same mankind that let Hitler have his way will have to face God’s judgment once again for failing to fulfill its moral responsibility.”

– Kang Chol-Hwan, who spent time in a North Korean gulag, writing about Kim Jong-Il in The Aquariums of Pyongyang

***

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has the most abominable, morally repugnant government on the face of the Earth. It cannot boast of any accomplishments, save for its survival up to this point…and even then, this is due mostly to the the aiding and abetting of the People’s Republic of China, itself no human rights paragon. Certainly, no credit is to be given to the Kim dynasty’s “self-reliance” ideology; the truth is, North Korea is a parasite.

Which is why North Korea’s launch of a missile today, Sunday, April 5, 2009, angers me deeply.

Even if it were the case that North Korea had actually launched a satellite, what purpose would it serve? How would the people of North Korea, starving by the millions, benefit from such a device orbiting the planet? What good would a “communications satellite” do a people who aren’t permitted to own cell phones or access the internet? Were we talking about a military satellite, that would at least make some sense, given Pyongyang’s militaristic government.

But still, with a significant percentage of its 23 million people starving, impoverished and imprisoned, North Korea has no business spending time and money on satellite development of any kind, much less on provocative rocket launches designed with the express purpose of pissing off the rest of the world. Kim Jong-Il is a monster, but he’s an all-too-human monster. It’s easy for some people to turn a blind eye to evil’s existence in this world; they do so to everyone’s detriment.

In the wake of North Korea’s latest thumb-nosing of the world, I issue a call for the following maxim, from Thomas Jefferson, to be read, remembered and adhered to with regard to the Pyongyang regime: “Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.” When all is said and done, more is said than done. I pray that as far as North Korea is concerned, this status quo is tolerated not much longer. War is not necessarily the only answer; but neither, either, is appeasement.

It’s Jerusalem’s Burden, but the World’s to Blame

Oddly, there are more concerns these days about Israeli prime minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu’s commitment to the peace process than the commitment of the Palestinians. Is it to be taken for granted, then, that the Palestinians – who elected Hamas to power prior to that terrorist group’s power-grab in the Gaza Strip – are more committed than Israel to peace? How about the Palestinian Authority, controlled by the Fatah faction – one of whose former officials, Muhammad Dahlan, recently advised the Hamas movement not to recognize Israel’s right to exist…because Fatah itself hasn’t done so?

The lion’s share of the burden of peace is almost always placed on the State of Israel. Why? Is it because Israel gave up land for peace, and received suicide bombers and rockets in return? Why, pray tell, aren’t as many questions – there should be a helluva lot more – being raised about the Palestinian Authority’s commitment to recognizing Israel and seeking peace? One would think if the Palestinian Authority leadership truly cared about the welfare of their people (more than their own power and prominence), they would have been able long ago to reach a lasting accord with Israel – which gave up land for peace with both Egypt and Jordan.

A disproportionate amount of blame is heaped on Israel for the peace process’s failure thus far, and yet, Benjamin Netanyahu has been able to reach a coalition deal with the Israeli Labor party by agreeing to uphold previous agreements with the Palestinians. If the Palestinian factions of Hamas and Fatah can’t come to an agreement based on a similar arrangement vis-a-vis Israel, it will be their hardline stance, and not any Israeli leader’s, that is the most responsible for further delays on the road to peace. In the past, Israel’s leaders have shown themselves to be true statesmen – worthy, willing and able to make sacrifices to end states of war. 

The same cannot be said of the Palestinians’ leaders.

This is not mere opinion; this is a fact.

Why are Israel’s leaders alone judged by the world media, based on their commitment to peace? This gives a pass to past Palestinian intransigence, including surreptitious arms purchases from Iran (anyone remember the Karine-A incident?) and fanning the flames of anti-Semitic, anti-Israeli hatred on Palestinian Authority-run television stations. Are either Abbas’s Fatah or Haniyeh’s Hamas, which have yet to recognize Israel’s right to exist (a Phase One “Road Map to Peace” provision), to be considered partners for peace, while Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud – which concluded the peace treaty with former arch-enemy Egypt – aren’t?

Such a view smacks of the grossest sort of hypocrisy on the part of the international community. But then, when it comes to the conflict between the Israelis and the Arabs, this isn’t anything new, so we shouldn’t be surprised. Their stance has usually been thus: “When in doubt, blame the Jews and give their enemies the benefit of the doubt.” Nothing’s changed, and until it does, a bewildered world will have only itself to blame for the lack of peace between Jerusalem, Ramallah and Gaza. In fact, the mainstream media and international community are as much to blame for the absence of Israeli-Palestinian peace as the Palestinians themselves.

But then, I am speaking as a commonsensical Jew…and a proudly American-born Israeli. Of course I’m going to say that!