Listening to the settlers interviewed in this story I find myself hoping that they're just full of bluster about their claim that over 2,000 years ago God gave Eretz Israel to the Jews; that it's the last word on it and any claims on the land by people who happened to be living there since are irrelevant. My wish is that once they realize the majority of Jews would rather they quit the lands Israel captured in 1967 and work with us to try and bring a non-violent end to the conflict. I'm afraid we can't indulge in such fantasy. For those of us who value human life and rights it is time to take note and be prepared to take action. We now know the more recent residents of the Judean hills, the Palestinians, are willing to go to arms over this land - against the entire Jewish nation, where ever it resides. Ethics dictate that when one can anticipate violent harm it is one's duty to first take nonviolent action in one's defense before countering with force. That is, first one must seek to diffuse the situation.
Those of us who oppose the settlers' agenda need to prepare for the coming ethical shit storm. If we step back and allow the settlers to decide policy for Israel we will bear witness to a two-way genocide the moral implications of which will dwarf those of the Holocaust. For in WWII the Jewish world's failure was only to recognize and do enough defend European Jewry. In the coming conflict our choice will be to either repeat that failure or come to Israel's aid as they inflict a similar genocide of Rwandan proportions (WolframA: http://tinyurl.com/ozdrg2).
So what's the alternative? To decide, peacefully, democratically, nonviolently, to do what we can to diffuse and do the right thing. Abandon the settlements. We can't control what will happen in Palestine or the rest of the Arab world. We can only lead the way by moral example. The likely outcome is that abandoning the settlements will result in a bit of a Jewish civil war. At some point it comes down to faith. I for one have more faith in the rule of secular law than the self serving religious interpretations of the settlers.Yigal Amir has shown us there's no way around Jewish bretheren shedding some blood, but at least the side of the righteous (my side, of course) can have the state behind it, which means we can try, convict and imprison law breakers. The other side (the messianics) can only murder. If we must compare suffering, a generally pointless exercise, let's consider we're talking about the suffering of a 187K group of humans (Settlers) with less than 40 years recent history in the land vs. a 2.5 mm group of humans (Palestinians) with many hundreds of such years. But it's an a moral calculus and irrelevant to those who don't value human life above other considerations. The moral thing is to abandon the settlements. The rest is just enforcing rule of law.
if this outcome could only have happened if Richardson had to withdraw from Commerce Secretary candidacy then I say that's a very beautiful fail.
No Jeff, we are definitely NOT tired of the media getting blamed. Two reasons:
1. mainstream media (msm) journalism has STILL not learned it's lesson. their job is to inform in an entertaining way, not cover up the truth with a bunch clowning and histrionics
2. the likes of Stewart and Colbert have only scratched the surface when it comes to expressing the outrage felt by the reasonable minority (in which i shamelessly and full of hubris include myself).
This is why I LOVE Jon Stewart. He's the only one that can get away with speaking this kind of truth without sounding like a curmudgeon. He cleverly, yet humorously, points out that presidential rhetoric is inherently empty no matter how eloquent the orator. Anyone can put great word in someone's mouth. They can't make them do great deeds.
Obama's first day in office has begun with good deeds: close gitmo, assign Mitchell to the Mid East, and Holbrook to Central Asia.
We're watching...
was sent an email today by someone trying to sway his friends. so disturbing that there are jews who think this way. not a single thing here is factually true:
Here are some simple TruthsIf Israel is on your priority list of issues then you must seriously consider that Obama has;-surrounded himself with abundant Anti-Israel advisors-supports talking with Iran which calls for the destruction of Israel-had Never supported Israel until this election-gave his so-called "support" of Israel and an undivided Jerusalem at the AIPAC conference and took it back within 24 hours, which means he does believe in a dividing JerusalemRemember Martin Luther King said to be Anti-Israel is Anti-SemeticMcCAIN IS THE ONLY FOR SURE CHOICE WHEN IT COMES TO ISRAEL
RS:You totally should. I've been really tempted myself
and even downloaded the vmware image to try to run
the software via an emulator and see what it was like
(I didn't succeed).Another big surprise was the walmart $200 linux pc :
http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/12/2235200Not as feel-good as the olpc (kind of the opposite I
guess), but still nice to see this kind of thing
coming out.
I did. Put in my order on the 12th from xxxx. $423 with shipping. Not sure when it's due to arrive, but I'd like to think w/in the next week.
Yes, I'm very curious about this thing and have been following it for a while. I've got an ongoing interest in international development work and have a cousin that works for the UN doing food aid distribution and have talked to him about it. I had a bit of cynical skepticism (what? you're going to give a starving child a laptop? gee, isn't that nice.), but he said that there are some good examples where internet access in rural areas has really helped -- farmers being able to check rice prices online so they're not gouged by the local buyer, villages being able to check how much aid the gov't allotted to them so they can bitch when the local governor is corrupt.
In short, I like the concept and was willing to throw $200 at it as a donation. I was even more willing to throw another $200 and get one for myself. Partly I just want to see whether I like what they've come up with and how well it works. On the selfish level, though, I figure it's a cheap, durable laptop for travel -- web access, a bit of text work, we'll see if it's any good for photos. Plus, between low power consumption and the supposed ability to charge from a solar cell (don't think it comes with it...I'm planning to try hooking it up to one of the battery trickle chargers they use on sailboats), you could use it to hang out in the park (or, in my case, on a boat) for the day.
Don't remember if you were around when J. & I were talking about it, but he's thinking about getting one too. It's an open-source Linux system, which he figures he can just replace with a command-based version, and he can use it in the park to work on code development.
In any case, I've got one headed my way. I'll let you know what I think.
Which TV show never "jumped the shark"?
Submitted by healthypanda.
seinfeld
Hey maybe I don't even need a bike this year! http://laughingsquid.com/1200-bikes-donated-to-burning-man-yellow-bike-program/
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on thinking of getting a One Laptop: http://www.laptopgiving.org/en/index.php