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Go Home An Apology

THE SPINE SEPTEMBER 13, 2010

An Apology

BY MARTIN PERETZ

Nicholas Kristof and I do not see the world—and America's role in it—in the same way. I have sometimes expressed my disagreements with his opinions vociferously (vociferousness is my business). But in yesterday’s The New York Times, he quotes two sentences that I recently wrote—one of them genuinely embarrasses me, and I deeply regret it.

The embarrassing sentence is: "I wonder whether I need honor these people and pretend they are worthy of the privileges of the First Amendment, which I have in my gut the sense that they will abuse." I wrote that, but I do not believe that. I do not think that any group or class of persons in the United States should be denied the protections of the First Amendment, not now, not ever. When I insist upon a sober recognition of the threats to our security, domestic threats included, I do not mean to suggest that the Constitution and its order of rights should in any way be abrogated. I would abhor such a prospect. I do not wish upon Muslim Americans the sorts of calumnies that were endured by Italian Americans in connection with Sacco and Vanzetti and Jewish Americans in connection with communism. My recent comments on the twisted Koran-hating reverend in Gainesville will give evidence of that. So I apologize for my sentence, not least because it misrepresents me.

The other sentence is: "Frankly, Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims." This is a statement of fact, not value. In his column, Kristof made this seem like a statement of bigotry. But on his blog, he notes that he concurs with it. "Peretz makes some points that are valid, and I agree with him that Muslims haven’t said nearly enough about those Muslims who kill other Muslims—in Kurdish areas, in Iraq, in Western Sahara, in Sudan, and so on." 

Every week brings more and more gruesome evidence of this, in the the Middle East and Central Asia and elsewhere. The idea that in remarking upon the cheapening of Muslim lives I was calling for the cheapening of Muslim lives, as some have suggested, is preposterous. There is no hatred in my heart; there is deep anxiety about the dangers of Islamism, and anger at the refusal of certain politicians and commentators to adequately grasp those dangers, but there is no hatred, none. In these unusually inflamed days, I am glad to say so clearly.

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497 comments

I am glad to see this apology, as a longtime reader. Frankly, I was horrified by the first sentence when I read it last week. Glad to see it was a mistake, and not indicative of your views.

- ngever

September 13, 2010 at 10:40am

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Twice in a month or so - not bad. But ... this one, too, comes with a caveat: "So I apologize for my sentence, not least because it misrepresents me." "The sentence I wrote misrepresents me." Does this mean: 1. I don't read what I write, when I write in anger; 2. I need an editor; 3. I should stop writing when I am drunk; 4. I write when I don't have my full faculties; ... The mind boggles. As for the second sentence, "Frankly, Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims", I make the following two observations. First, as drafted that sentence is a statement of bigotry because it reads as follows: "Muslim life is cheap for everyone, but especially for Muslims." (If you just want to make the point that in Muslim soceties, Muslim life is cheap (which is as close to a truism as one can get), you simply make the point; you don't put "especially" in there. "Especially", as a matter of English construction, indicates that the preceding statement is generally true, but especially the case for what follows.) Second, context is all. Marty and his fellow enablers spend inordinate amounts of space in arguing how violent Muslims, Muslim societies, Islam, Islamism and Arabs are; Marty seems incapable of making a distinction between Islam and Islamist terrorism; and even such a thing as naming a community centre after a Spanish city with Moorish history is taken as evidence of the conquistador tendencies of Muslim communities. In this context, the comment on the value of Muslim life appeared, and appears, rather more general than merely in relation to what Muslims themselves feel or see.

- icarusr

September 13, 2010 at 10:43am

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חכמים הזהרו בדברכם פרקי אבות, פרק א' משנה י"א Oh scholars, be heedful of what you say. Chapters of the Fathers (Mishna), Chapter 1, Mishna 11 (the ginzy translation). Hershel Ginsburg Jerusalem / Efrata

- ginzy

September 13, 2010 at 10:59am

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"Marty and his fellow enablers spend inordinate amounts of space in arguing how violent Muslims, Muslim societies, Islam, Islamism and Arabs are" Aren't the Muslim societies in the Middle East violent, regardless of political extremism which comes with its own set of violent conventions? Honour killings, sharia-sanctioned wife beatings, legalized rape, persecution of gays, stoning of women, removing limbs by way of legal punishment, public beheadings, legal lashings, bellicose media, books full of incitement for hatred, death threats and what not. Why is it wrong to notice all this? Because we have here husbands who beat their wives, men who rape, people who can't stand homosexuals, and any number of other violent crimes? As usual, icarusr can't control himself. He may have one or two good arguments to make but like George Costanza and his jokes, he never knows when to stop. At which point, he loses whatever good arguments he did make and goes overboard.

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 11:21am

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I'm one of the biggest Marty critics here and even I defended him on the second sentence (on twitter). Many (probably most) of the people who fell overthemselves yesterday to praise Kristof (who I admire) either ignore Darfur and other atrocities that have happened in Muslim nations with the proactive support of the Arab League or are coldly realpolitik towards the same. Noga: It's not wrong to "notice all this." It is wrong to notice it and use it to advance an unrelated political agenda (i.e., Israel) while at the same time ignoring it everywhere else. Congo alone exceeds the combined human rights crimes in the Middle East.

- Lymon1

September 13, 2010 at 11:29am

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I don't know if icarusr's #2 is correct, but I would think that it would have prevented things not intended from being written. Wieseltier famously got a deal with Peretz that he would not be subject to editing; I find it hard to believe that Peretz would have given this privilege to someone else but not himself. (Privilege is questionable, given the risks entailed)

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 11:31am

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Noga, you missed the point. Only Israeli Jews (especially the "settlers") are violent, which of course leads to a violent, militaristic Israeli culture. The others are only expressing themselves in their cultural context. hg

- ginzy

September 13, 2010 at 11:32am

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Good point, Lymon, and the Arab league are not the only enablers of the Darfur horror. China also comes to mind, and that's not exactly an Islamic power center.

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 11:33am

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Actually, China has a large Muslim minority, the presence of which some claim does have some impact on Chinese foreign policy. hg

- ginzy

September 13, 2010 at 11:36am

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Lymon: as I noted above, "If you just want to make the point that in Muslim societies, Muslim life is cheap (which is as close to a truism as one can get), you simply make the point." Marty did not just make that point. It is possible that he meant to make the simple and unimpeachable observation that Muslim societies and/or Arab governments tend to be hypocritical (at best) and callous (more likely) when it comes to Muslim loss of life in any context other than Israel/Palestine. In which case, he really does need an editor. But my second point goes to your second paragraph: it is the context that matters, and in the context of Marty's posts (and that of his enablers, as we see, yet again, here), the truism ("in Muslim societies life is cheaper than in certain Western democracies") is invariably turned into something significantly more intolerant and disturbing.

- icarusr

September 13, 2010 at 11:44am

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Ginzy, don't the Chinese government notoriously mistreat many of their muslims (Didn't they get a bunch sent to Guantanamo?)?

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 11:44am

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"Actually, China has a large Muslim minority, the presence of which some claim does have some impact on Chinese foreign policy." So the fact that China, as a matter of national policy, rejects any discussion of humanitarian law altogether in any forum and in respect of any atrocity anywhere is secondary to the presence of a poor and heavily oppressed Muslim minority in the north-west steppes, who, "some" claim, have an inordinate impact on Chinese policy? This is a bit of a teach, don't you think? China also does not have anything to say about Rwanda or the Congo, and opposed the bombing of Serbia. Last I checked, there were no Serbian or Congolese minorities in China. Please - this is getting ridiculous.

- icarusr

September 13, 2010 at 11:49am

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"It is wrong to notice it and use it to advance an unrelated political agenda (i.e., Israel) while at the same time ignoring it everywhere else. Congo alone exceeds the combined human rights crimes in the Middle East" If Israel is singled out for criticism when its military forces uses violent (Gaza war) and non-violent means (building a fence, check points) to suppress and pre-empt violence against innocent civilians and when this type of conduct is then used by Israel-bashers to malign Israeli society as a pathologically violent society (done all the time, all the time all the time) then it is perfectly legitimate to mention that those cows over there, not so far away, are the real violent societies with the pathologies imputed to Israeli society. We live in an inter-connected world where every crime is excused by root-causes except when it comes to lsrael, where every act of active self-defence is defined as a crime against Palestinians or humanity. If you cite that "Congo alone exceeds the combined human rights crimes in the Middle East" then you must be in agreement with me. How come if that is so, the world public opinion, the UN and its many organs, HTW and Amnesty, are so obsessively focused on Israel? Andre Glucksmann asked: "On the scales of world opinion, some Muslim corpses are light as a feather, and others weigh tonnes. Two measures, two weights. The daily terrorist attacks on civilians in Baghdad, killing 50 people or more, are checked off in reports under the heading of miscellaneous, while the bomb that took 28 lives in Qana is denounced as a crime against humanity. Only a few intellectuals ...find this surprising. Why do the 200,000 slaughtered Muslims of Darfur not arouse even half a quarter of the fury caused by 200-times fewer dead in Lebanon? Must we deduce that Muslims killed by other Muslims don't count - whether in the eyes of Muslim authorities or viewed through the bad conscience of the west?"

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 11:50am

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*reach ...

- icarusr

September 13, 2010 at 11:50am

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To be honest, the Chinese Muslim community is not a story that I follow closely, and frankly I doubt that anyone can. Yes, my impression is that they do mistreat them but also despite having relations with Israel I believe the Chinese government often acts in international arenas with a small eye to their Muslim minority, so as not to get them to restive. BTW, India acts the same but on a greater scale presumably because their Muslim minority forms a larger overall percentage of its citizenry. This despite India forming very close security & tourism relationships with Israel. hg

- ginzy

September 13, 2010 at 11:54am

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each one r/teach one

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 11:55am

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Should be "too restive". hg

- ginzy

September 13, 2010 at 11:56am

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And speaking of the triple standard (Jeff Goldberg's term) on how the liberal / left / progressobabbelians relate to Israel, here is an interesting if not downright creative suggestion: http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/oped/2010/sep/10/ed-hinkle10-ar-497779/ hg

- ginzy

September 13, 2010 at 12:01pm

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If the editor in chief needs an editor, who really is the editor at TNR?? The points about muslim double standards is true, but before we single out muslims either as a people or religion, let us remember that the Holocaust was done by Christians in the name of Christian theology (and of course it was not just Nazis involved) or the slaughter from secular ideologies like Communism.

- NR027810

September 13, 2010 at 12:13pm

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Your contention that Kristof agrees with your "Muslim life is cheap" comment is not supported by the quote of his you provide. And, in fact, Kristof takes exception.

- W_Bombay

September 13, 2010 at 12:18pm

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I am glad for the apology. I was horrified too and doubly horrified to see the Kristof piece. One of the problems with blogs or any other internet writing: it's so easy to a) make a mistake because of the speed of the thing - before you'd have to do a hard copy, edit it, think about it, then publish but now? Yikes. b) it's easy to be misinterpreted, people are reading just as fast as we are writing and this means people aren't reading carefully either. Between the two we have full-fledged firestorms. I gotta say though there are times I Kristof gets on my nerves. And apologists for Middle Eastern violence, misogyny, intolerance and antisemitism et.al. also get on my nerves.

- Sophia

September 13, 2010 at 12:28pm

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"let us remember that the Holocaust was done by Christians in the name of Christian theology" Christian theology was about pressuring Jews to convert ("let them live but not thrive"). Nazism was born out of racial theories in which a Jew was a Jew was a Jew and as such must be exterminated. The Final solution was a direct result of Nazi racial theories. That many European Christians collaborated with it either due to fear or Jew-hatred is indisputable. But it was not done in the name of Christian theology. That is a lie about which intentions I don't even wish to speculate.

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 12:35pm

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The problem is that "Life is cheap for [insert name of group here]" is an old racist slur, variously used in the past against blacks, Jews, Asians, American Indians and no doubt others. It's an artful bit of jiu-jitsu in which you dehumanize a group by claiming that it dehumanizes itself, so you're merely making an observation -- exactly as Peretz does here. One should always assume that the feeling that life is precious inheres in all human beings. Political circumstances sometimes override this feeling, but that happens from time to time in all societies. If, say, the U.S. sacrifices its troops -- its "finest young men and women," etc. etc. -- in a pointless war, does that mean that, in some general way, "American life is cheap" or Americans don't care as much about their own lives as, say, the Swiss, who make a point of staying out of wars? I guess for Peretz it would.

- Jeff_Smith

September 13, 2010 at 1:06pm

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Mr. Peretz, thank you.

- dmillstone

September 13, 2010 at 1:24pm

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noga "But it was not done in the name of Christian theology. That is a lie about which intentions I don't even wish to speculate." I had no intentions about casting aspersions on Christian theology but that it has often been miscast aspects of this theology that has created problems in history esp. that of Jews being responsible for death of Christ. Although Nazis had maybe secular themes other Europeans picked up on them with their own ancient and religious based prejudices. I am saying that it is wrong to point specifically to muslims as violent and uncaring about its own dead when self-promulgated and in the case of Gingrich/Palin/Rupert Murdoch/ some defenders of Israel, political opportunism. In fact, muslim memories of their own injustices by other muslims seem to run very deep, hence intractable Shiite/ Sunni rivalry in Iraq and elsewhere that is more than a theological dispute.

- NR027810

September 13, 2010 at 1:31pm

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Amen Jeff Smith

- NR027810

September 13, 2010 at 1:32pm

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I'm always surprised at the shallowness of knowledge and sheer intellectual laziness in people who are supposed to be educated and thoughtful. These are manifest when conversation turns to the Holocaust, Nazism, Israel, Jewish history, etc. Whatever nugget can be lifted from any account to support one's political positions, why not do it? Somehow I expected that the NR027's "Christian theology responsible for Nazi crimes" would translate/morph into "Gingrich/Palin/Rupert Murdoch/ some defenders of Israel". How could it not? Apparently, noticing the ubiquitous violence in Muslim societies leads most naturally to these formulations.

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 1:47pm

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NR027810:"let us remember that the Holocaust was done by Christians in the name of Christian theology" "I had no intentions about casting aspersions on Christian theology"

- jacko

September 13, 2010 at 1:57pm

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You're too quick for me, Noga.

- jacko

September 13, 2010 at 1:58pm

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Thanks to Mr. Peretz for his at least halfway apology. It at least gives me some relief from the notion that he might just be a more highly educated, more articulate, city-slicker version of "that individual" in Gainsville, Fla.

- Haole45

September 13, 2010 at 2:22pm

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I have sworn off the Spine and have kept to it and will keep to it except for this comment on today's somewhat refreshing post: I am glad that Mr. Peretz is now reflecting on his words. Since 1983, I have read his words and he is a decidedly passionate, opinionated man. There have been more than several times when I have read his words and sensed that he was being willfully incendiary and provocative. It often seemed that because of his elevated status as owner of this fine magazine, he was essentially telling his readers and even at times his staff, if you don't like what I say, F off. I'm me and you're you, so F off buddy. I have always felt that this kind of sentiment is useful in small does - some people should, nay, need to be told to F off - but in large doses, it is tiresome and unappealing. And never an apology, even for the most frightful and provocative utterances. Recently, it does seem that something has changed with Mr. Peretz and he is more reflective and even contrite about some of his arguably bigoted or let us say, extremely ill-advised comments. This is a positive development and I applaud him for doing so.

- MrCookie1

September 13, 2010 at 2:26pm

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"The points about muslim double standards is true, but before we single out muslims either as a people or religion, let us remember that the Holocaust was done by Christians in the name of Christian theology (and of course it was not just Nazis involved) or the slaughter from secular ideologies like Communism." dhurtado, I think the point you are trying to make, although the sentence structure is not very clear, is that there have been huge slaughters perpetrated by Communists and Fascists in the West, so it's unfair to pick on Muslims exclusively. I agree that it's unfair, but more importantly, it misses the key point. What really matters is what they all have in common: they were, and are, totalitarian ideologies that seek absolute dominance and murder everything in their way without blinking twice. The good news is that Communism and Fascism have been defeated and no longer dominate the societies in which they flourished. The bad news is that the totalitarian impulse is still alive and well in the Muslim world where hundreds of thousands have been slaughtered in recent decades for the purpose of creating a purer, more perfect world. What is not commonly understood is that contemporary Islamist insanity is a direct transplant from the West, inspired by the early twentieth century madness of Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini. This story is eloquently told by Paul Berman in "Terror and Liberalism" for anyone who wants to follow the trail.

- willjames77

September 13, 2010 at 2:28pm

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Jacko: whether or not NR0 meant to cast aspersions on Christian theology is for him to decide. But, if you put quotes side by side with the presumed intention of demonstrating inconsistency, at least make sure that the inconsistency is apparent. Arguing that Christians did evil "in the name of Christian theology" is not quite the same thing as casting aspersions on the theology itself. In fact, much the bulk of the debate/discussion/hollering on these boards revolves around precisely this distinction when it comes to Islam, Muslims and Islamist terrorism. Some criticise Muslims doing evil in the name of Islamic theology as a proxy for criticising Ismalic theology itself; others, however, make a distinction between the two. One can quite credibly denounce Islamist terrorism, done in the name of a perverted interpretation of Islamic theology, without necessarily casting aspersions on the theology itself. The distinction is logically important especially where 1) the theology may have been misinterpreted, or badly interpreted, by the perpetrators; or 2) the theology has multiple valid interpretations, only some of which lead to violence and terrorism. Though I confess that it does not surprise me that some, like Marty himself, are incapable of making the distinction.

- icarusr

September 13, 2010 at 2:45pm

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willianjames77: I often appreciate what you offer on these pages. I, too, am acquainted with Mr. Berman's work. Personally I find the idea of trying to fix ideologies on past systems futile. I suppose we can find sympathies, similarities and convergences in rationales but I always find the most eloquent explicator to be universally held self rationalizing capacity for evil as embodied in our none other than anthro/spiritual symbolic ancestor and co-progenitor Beelzebub. It's all about self wanting and conceit. Ever thus a , "Yeah, but...."

- jacko

September 13, 2010 at 2:48pm

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Hey Ick. Quite frankly I think violent Muslims are to be held relatively innocent from accusations of hypocrisy. That in my view is a problem.

- jacko

September 13, 2010 at 2:52pm

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It's absolutely not true that the holocaust was done in the name of Christian theology. It's chief promulgaters were not christians at all. however, the misguided application* of Christian theology was at least partially behind a great deal of the acquiescence that that Nazis found in Germany, and open embrace of the Final Solution by, for example, Poland, as well as other countries. *: not the real and original, IMHO, version of Christianity which is supposed to be respectful of Judaism- the very first Christians also considered themselves Jews, for the first several hundred years, but sadly this aspect aof respect for Jews disappeared for a very long time starting with the integration into the Roman Empire and has only recently been reclaimed by some Christians, with varying degrees of credibility. I am not making a claim about what Christians did for a very long portion of their time on earth as a faith, which was deplorable as far as its treatment of Jews, but about the original intent and early practice of the faith, before it was, in its most popular iteration hijacked in service of, among other things, rank anti-semitism.

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 2:58pm

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Jacko: You might well have special insight into Islam as a faith and into the beliefs of 1.odd billion Muslims. Still, I recommend that you read "23 Years" - the most trenchant historical denunciation of Mohammed ever published in a Muslim society (its author, Ali Dashti, Iran's first romantic novellist, was finally hunted down and slaughtered after the revolution). No one has done a better job of dismantling Islamic and Koranic mythology and laying bare the truly violent foundations of Islamic governance. (He was an Islamic scholar at the time he wrote the book.) And yet, I suspect that even he would disagree with your vast generalization.

- icarusr

September 13, 2010 at 4:02pm

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Marty, Kristof doesn't "concur." http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/13/a-martin-peretz-apology/ Guess you'll have to find another justification for your bigotry. Anyway, why are so many of you eager to pat the old man on the back? Yeah, he apologized, but that's worth nothing. We all know he meant every word, and has basically written this garbage in some form for 20+ years.

- misterbones

September 13, 2010 at 4:40pm

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Just for the record, NR027810 is not dhurtado. Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 4:58pm

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Ick. Seems to me that I was talking about the specific accusation of hypocrisy. Ali Dashti apparently suffered the consequences of unapologetic blasphemy. There is nothing hypocritical about his murder according to Islam.

- jacko

September 13, 2010 at 5:12pm

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Apologies to you, NR143296. Didn't mean to confuse you with NR027810!

- willjames77

September 13, 2010 at 5:13pm

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So, Marty apologizes for something he said and the usual suspects (like Icarus) attack him anyway. Icarus has an Iranian sense of justice. I prefer Marty's occasional intemperate post to anything Icarus’ vile and unjust views no matter how he tries to sugarcoat them.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 5:14pm

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willjames77 "Apologies to you, NR143296. Didn't mean to confuse you with NR027810!" How could you not? I confuse NR143296, NR027810, NR145596, NR027310 all the time.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 5:16pm

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Speaking of hypocrisy: “Ground Zero Mosque Group Includes 9/11 Denier” http://www.investigativeproject.org/2172/ground-zero-mosque-group-includes-9-11-denier

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 5:18pm

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Jackson: I have spoken with Iranians and one of my cherished fellow bloggers blogs from Tehran. There is nothing wrong with their sense of justice. They actually have eyes wide open and keen critical faculties. Icarusr is actually an exception in that respect. He sounds much more like the ayatollahs than any Iranian I know.

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 5:19pm

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That's why he grates on nerves, I should add.

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 5:21pm

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Jacko, I think we all have a certain amount of selfish preoccupation with looking out for #1. And that's definitely responsible for some of the misery and suffering in the world. But I think that the really spectacular slaughters where millions are thrilled out of their minds to be a part of a "final solution" to the world's ills have another source. It's a dream of Oneness that will get rid of all the distressing Otherness in the world. Whether it's a fantasy of racial or religious superiority, it remains a very powerful dream that sucks in people like a super vacuum cleaner and spits out ruthless killers who want to commit holy murder until only the good and pure are left.

- willjames77

September 13, 2010 at 5:24pm

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“Icarusr is actually an exception in that respect. He sounds much more like the ayatollahs than any Iranian I know.” You may be right about that. I have a friend who is from Iran comes from a wealthy Muslim family and who graduated from Brandeis of all places and he completely different. I think of him as an exception, (he is a devote student of the Frankfurt school) but he may not be.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 5:37pm

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willjames77 "It's a dream of Oneness that will get rid of all the distressing Otherness in the world. Whether it's a fantasy of racial or religious superiority, it remains a very powerful dream that sucks in people like a super vacuum cleaner and spits out ruthless killers who want to commit holy murder until only the good and pure are left." Well said, WJ.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 5:42pm

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william77: Please accept the abbreviation. I agree completely with your comment. Those grand scale obscenities do indeed dwell in the collective bow before such a perverse dream. The resolution of Individual and Collective has always been the source of contention. That is where the Liar does his best work taking advantage of the most banal ignorance parading it as vision.

- jacko

September 13, 2010 at 5:45pm

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Jackson, the 9/11 denier guy is only slightly wackier than many of the folks on the farther reaches of the left who are anti-corporate, anti-government, anti-fluoride. When you stop to think how inept the Bush gov't was in coordinating the post-Iraq invasion environment or even dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, it makes you wonder how anyone could believe that these same folks coordinated and pulled off a spectacular act of self-destruction like 9/11 without glitch. It seems like there's a whole sub-culture out there that thrives on projecting its self-hatred upon its own country.

- willjames77

September 13, 2010 at 5:51pm

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willjames77, you are right of course. Too often what drives history is self serving ignorance and stupidity.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 6:15pm

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I agree that 9/11 denial is wacky. But keep in mind that the right also has its crazies. (as do most groups of religious faiths- it's a pretty evenhanded distribution). Does anyone doubt that among the protesters against the mosque there are included a few anti-fluoride people, a few new earthers, and a few who believe that Obama is a kenyan manchurian candidate who was born anywhere on earth other than hawaii?

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 7:02pm

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It's a start Marty. But any spritual figure of any sort, let alone common sense - will tell you that apologies have to be unconditional to count. This is still so self-serving. It's better than your usual adding to the mob-mentality out there, but it still stinks of too much ego. You said hateful, stupid things, period. Try again. This is neither a real apology nor atonement of any sort.

- WandreyCer

September 13, 2010 at 7:02pm

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"I agree that 9/11 denial is wacky. But keep in mind that the right also has its crazies. (as do most groups of religious faiths- it's a pretty evenhanded distribution). Does anyone doubt that among the protesters against the mosque there are included a few anti-fluoride people, a few new earthers, and a few who believe that Obama is a kenyan manchurian candidate who was born anywhere on earth other than hawaii?" Irrelevant whataboutery. Or, as roidubouloi would say: oh, look, cows :)

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 7:12pm

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miceel "I agree that 9/11 denial is wacky. But keep in mind that the right also has its crazies." So, according to you we should not speak out against the Reverend who wanted to burn the Koran because there are Muslim clerics who also burn the Bible.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 7:19pm

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"Atone" is such a loaded religious word. It makes my blood curdle. In medieval times, heretics were burnt at the stake by way of atonement for their sins of digression. You see, an open apology in a public forum is not enough. Marty must be made to atone. Imam Rauf, has anyone demanded that he atone for what he said about American culpability in 9/11? He apologized to Ooledad O'brien and the American public but shouldn't he atone?

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 7:21pm

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"Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims...This is a statement of fact, not value." More like an incredibly sweeping generalization, applied to millions of Muslims all over the world, based on the behavior of a small fraction of them who happen to be crazy crackpots. About as valid as, "Jews are unprincipled and greedy, especially the ones who work on Wall Street. This is a statement of fact, not value." I think we deserve one more apology.

- Zavel

September 13, 2010 at 8:06pm

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So Zavel gets to air his little antisemitic smear under cover of a noble attempt to redeem the Muslims from the Jew's smears! Such cleverness. Why make an effort to find a more equitable parallel to the murderous Muslims who were responsible for 9/11 and their many supporters? For example, he could have thought about Nazis and Europeans, or Hizzballa and Lebanese, or Taliban and Afghans. But no. The very first analogy that pops his head is Wall street Jews. Such a precise analogy and so instructive. "Zavel", is this your chosen name? Do you what the word means in Hebrew? Very appropriate, too.

- noga1

September 13, 2010 at 8:19pm

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Zavel “"Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims...This is a statement of fact, not value." More like an incredibly sweeping generalization, applied to millions of Muslims all over the world, based on the behavior of a small fraction of them who happen to be crazy crackpots.” This is ignorant drivel. The “small fraction of them who happen to be crazy crackpots” have killed millions of Muslims and non Muslims in Algeria (hundreds of thousands) in Sudan (millions) during the Iran iraq war (millions of people) and elsewhere like Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria, Sothern Asia, etc. You should apologize for your ignorance, Zavel. “About as valid as, "Jews are unprincipled and greedy, especially the ones who work on Wall Street. This is a statement of fact, not value." This is an antisemitic comparison precisely because it’s false. “I think we deserve one more apology.” You are a contemptible individual.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 8:21pm

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aplogize, apologize, take out his eyes: Hey zevel how about apologizing for this? "Iran Ayatollahs Issue Fatwas Against Koran-Burner" http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-09-13/iran-ayatollahs-issue-fatwas-against-koran-burners.html

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:04pm

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To any objective observer, the point of Zavel's comparison is precisely that it is not true that "Jews are unprincipled and greedy, especially the ones on Wall Street." Likewise, it is not true that "Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims." Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 9:05pm

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Whatever turns you on: "Australian lawyer smokes pages of Bible and Koran, asking 'Which is best?'" "An Australian lawyer, Alex Stewart, has smoked pages torn from the Koran and the Bible, posting the video on YouTube just days after an American Pastor's threat to burn the Muslim holy book caused worldwide outrage." http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/7999250/Australian-lawyer-smokes-pages-of-Bible-and-Koran-asking-Which-is-best.html

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:06pm

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Pulling up the rear, a few disparate thoughts. I think Peretz's apology was straightforward and okay. Enough said on that I think: no anatomizing of it necessary. I can't see the need to say "Muslim is cheap...especially for Muslims." There is enough criticism to be leveled at Muslim societies based on specific practices without these kinds of fairly meaningless imprecise cheap shots capable of diverse reading. Vociferousness is just rationalization for needless and possibly tendentious intemperateness here. I did not think Peretz made any case at all for Kristoff agreeing with him on his cheap thought. In fact I thought there was something pathetically desperate in it, so strained was it. I don't see one relevant dent that Rauf's close connection with a "truther" makes on the appropriateness of establishing the community centre amidst the bars, strip bars and other urban detritus on the same couple of blocks away from ground zero. And poor Zavel: asuming s/he in good faith believes Peretz's cheap shot is an insupportable and vile generalization, I can't see a whit of anti Semitism in his/her further comments.

- basman

September 13, 2010 at 9:11pm

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NR143296 "To any objective observer, the point of Zavel's comparison is precisely that it is not true that "Jews are unprincipled and greedy, especially the ones on Wall Street." Likewise, it is not true that "Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims."" Take a break, Dhurtado. If Muslim blood isn't cheap to other Muslims why have millions of them been butchered in Algeria (hundreds of thousands) in Sudan (millions) during the Iran iraq war (millions of people) and elsewhere like Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria, Sothern Asia, etc? Don’t you think Muslim blood is cheap in the Islamic Republic of Iran where hundreds of thousands have been sent to their death since they took power? So the comparison is a crock, right?

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:11pm

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To murderers, Jackson, human blood is cheap. It has nothing to do with Muslim blood being cheap. They murder whoever is in their way. Moreover, Peretz' statement implied that Muslim life is intrinsically cheap, only especially so among Muslims. So Zavel's comparison is apt, right? Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 9:25pm

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Moreover, even it were true that Muslims hold Muslim life to be cheap, certainly Zavel's point is that it is NOT true that Jews are "unprincipled and greedy." So even if the comparison were a "crock," accusing Zavel of anti-semitism on the basis of his comment is even more of a crock, right? Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 9:30pm

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The fundamental problem you will find, Dhurtado, is that several genuinely believe that muslim life IS cheaper and that there is no generalization about them that is more vile than true. So, any attempt to compare generalizations about Muslims with any other kind of generalization will be seen as a false comparison and insulting to whatever other group's generalization is being compared. Because, accoding to dyer and his merry band, Muslims simply aren't human like everyone else is.

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 9:32pm

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NR143296 “To murderers, Jackson, human blood is cheap. It has nothing to do with Muslim blood being cheap. They murder whoever is in their way. Moreover, Peretz' statement implied that Muslim life is intrinsically cheap, only especially so among Muslims. So Zavel's comparison is apt, right? Dhurtado You full of it, Hurtado, really. The Muslims killed by other Muslims were killed in the name of Islam. This something you will never be able to accept. You sound like those Nazi apologists who in the 30’s and even the 40’s made excuses for what they did. They, of course, blamed the Jews.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:37pm

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Here comes the other half of the team Hurtado and miceelf Islamic apologists and blame the Jews. To miceelf Jews are not human just useful for comparisons.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:41pm

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NR143296 "Moreover, even it were true that Muslims hold Muslim life to be cheap, certainly Zavel's point is that it is NOT true that Jews are "unprincipled and greedy." The comparison speaks for itself. He could have used any other people and or situaton but the Zevel/garbage poster decided to stick it to Jews. How do you know what this poster thinks about Jews?

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:43pm

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Yes, we know the story with dyer. Any criticism of bigotry against Arabs or Muslims is de facto proof of antisemitism. basman, thank you for the voice of reason.

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 9:44pm

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PS basman- like your brief explication of regression to the mean. Another very common example is the ebb and flow of (say) congressional seats, which is often attributed to fundamental shifts in the political views of the electorate, but is more often simply a correction toward the mean after an occasional abberant result.

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 9:47pm

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Because I say the the murderers, whether they murder in the name of Islam or not, show lack of regard for all human life, and not just Muslim life, I'm somehow defending the murderers???

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 9:47pm

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miceelf “Yes, we know the story with dyer. Any criticism of bigotry against Arabs or Muslims is de facto proof of antisemitism.” Yes, with you, an apologist for Muslims murderers, antisemitism is never far under the surface.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:48pm

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I have read TNR for 27 years and subscribed for 15 years. Tomorrow I will be calling to end my subscription. Have little use for much of what Peretz is against. But, he has finally gone too far, and frankly his apology is that of a five year old, at best. His stupidity was nationally noted so he decided to apologize under the headline "an apology" without taking any intellectual ownership/responsibility for his words. Felt the same way after Wieseltier's recent despicable attack on Andrew Sullivan. At some point one has to stop supporting hatred whomever it is directed at. If I subscribed to any periodicals with opposing offensive views, I'd be doing the same, but am down to just the New Yorker at this point. Unfortunately, ending my support for TNR, in particular Peretz, is my only opportunity to put my money where my mouth is. Will miss supporting wonderful voices such as Chait and Cottle and receiving what is for the most part a really good magazine. Particularly ironic as most recently received issue included the fantastic Washington Diarist by Wieseltier on supposed ground zero mosque. Tim

- timothycat

September 13, 2010 at 9:51pm

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NR143296 “Because I say the the murderers, whether they murder in the name of Islam or not, show lack of regard for all human life, and not just Muslim life, I'm somehow defending the murderers???” Think about the implications of what you are saying. Would one say that murders in Cambodia murdered hundreds of thousands of people or would you say “the Khmer Rouge” murdered them? The same with Nazis and Soviets and Maoists. Why then when you come to Islamicists you decide that they are not Muslims but just “murders.” This is the most laughable and pathetic apology for Islamicists I read thus far on this blog.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:52pm

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timothycat “I have read TNR for 27 years and subscribed for 15 years. Tomorrow I will be calling to end my subscription.” Don’t let the door hit your ass on the way out, Timothy.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 9:54pm

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I don't know what Zavel thinks about Jews, any more than you do, Jackson. But, unlike you, I have not made any judgments about what he/she thinks. But his/her words on this post do not reflect anti-semitism. Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 9:54pm

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NR143296 “I don't know what Zavel thinks about Jews, any more than you do, Jackson.” That’s not what you said above. “But, unlike you, I have not made any judgments about what he/she thinks.” Oh no, here is what you said: 09/13/2010 - 9:05pm EDT | NR143296 “To any objective observer, the point of Zavel's comparison is precisely that it is not true that "Jews are unprincipled and greedy, especially the ones on Wall Street." So you are the gold standard on objectivity. His comparison does reflect antisemitism had he used Hispanics or Black people by way of comparison you sense of objectivity would have led you to a different conclusion.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 10:09pm

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Noga says: "Why is it wrong to notice all this? Because we have here husbands who beat their wives, men who rape, people who can't stand homosexuals, and any number of other violent crimes?" If I may, I notice this theme often - "Just using my eyes" - and cannot disagree with it, because well, because the truth is the truth. I do however think, that Islam cannot and will not ever achieve any degree of modernity with blanket statements condemning their religion, any more than they will achieve this through limp-writsted enabling. Are the only choices one monolithic statement versus another?

- jmarshall

September 13, 2010 at 10:15pm

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I am looking at Zavel's comparison, Jackson, at his/her words on the page, not at his/her mental state. The comparison that Zavel made does not reflect anti-semitism because its premise is fhe FALSITY of the proposition that Jews are unprincipled and greedy. Whether Zavel is in fact anti-semitic I have no idea. But nothing in what Zavel said implies as much. As you probably have observed, I HAVE used comparisons to Black people with regard to the bias against Muslims that has been evident in the Ground Zero controversy. I don't think that makes me a racist. Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 10:20pm

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@jdyer - Yeah, it's always good when even a cultural Mennonite deserts.

- timothycat

September 13, 2010 at 10:20pm

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OK, Jackson. Have it your way. The Islamic murderers show lack of regard for all human life, and not just Muslim life. Happy? Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 10:24pm

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Oh I am sure the Mennonite culture won't suffer from not reading TNR. Otoh, my wife is an admirer of Mennonite quilts. She is forever pointing out to me its styles.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 10:26pm

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"Whether Zavel is in fact anti-semitic I have no idea. But nothing in what Zavel said implies as much." But this is the issue, isn't it?

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 10:28pm

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NR143296 "OK, Jackson. Have it your way. The Islamic murderers show lack of regard for all human life, and not just Muslim life. Happy? Dhurtado Well, it's a more accurate description of the tragedies in places like Algeria where whole villages were wiped out by Islamic fanatics for not being Muslim enough. It shows a lack of respect for the victims when one decides to see their deaths as senseless, which is the case when you call the killers merely "murders." Of course they are that but they murder in the name of Islam. If you can't name the cause how are you going to stop it?

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 10:32pm

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To your second to last post, Jackson, I don't know what you mean by "this is the issue isn't it?" As to your last post, what people are trying to make you understand is that when people murder in the name of Islam, it doesn't necessarily mean that Islam is the cause. Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 13, 2010 at 10:40pm

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@jdyer - kinda weak on your history, eh?

- timothycat

September 13, 2010 at 10:46pm

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By dyer's logic, Jodie Foster was responsible for the assassination attempt on Reagan. And, of course, the victims deaths only have meaning to the extent to which they can be used impugn an entire culture. Calling a murder victim's killer a murderer is not opprobrium enough; the real evil occurs if the killers are Muslim. Being a muslim is much worse than being a murderer

- miceelf

September 13, 2010 at 10:49pm

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How so, Tim?

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 10:52pm

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miceelf “By dyer's logic, Jodie Foster was responsible for the assassination attempt on Reagan.” No, by your logic! I don’t know anything about the Foster Regan connection. The rest is just apologetic drivel.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 10:55pm

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Zavel: More like an incredibly sweeping generalization, applied to millions of Muslims all over the world, based on the behavior of a small fraction of them who happen to be crazy crackpots. I don't know about that. Here is a partial list of Muslim fatalities resulting from internecine conflicts. Millions of Muslims have been killed by other Muslims throughout the Muslim world in the past half century. Algeria: 100,000 Muslims, mostly civilians, were killed in the civil war following the aborted 1991 elections. Afghanistan: After the withdrawal of the Soviet forces, Afghanistan went through a series of civil wars, resulting in about one million fatalities. (This was before the American invasion, which has caused a comparatively limited number of civilian deaths.) Bangladesh: Between one and two million people were massacred during the Pakistan invasion in 1971. Indonesia: In the government’s suppression of the communist uprising in 1965, approximately 400,000 Indonesians were killed. Iraq: Approximately two million victims. Iran: Approximately one million victims. Jordan: Between 10,000 and 25,000 fatalities during the suppression of Black September in 1970-71. Syria: In the 1982 massacre in the city of Hama, 20,000 people were killed. Sudan: During the various civil wars, approximately 2.6 million to 3 million Muslims, mostly black civilians, have been killed. Turkey: About 20,000 Kurds have been killed in Turkey. Somalia: Approximately 600,000 victims in the unending civil war since 1977. Yemen: Between 100,000 to 150,000 Yeminites were killed in the 1962-70 civil war. (Several thousand Egyptian and Saudi soldiers were killed as well.)

- JPKatz

September 13, 2010 at 11:18pm

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@jdyer - if you knew your history you'd have known "cultural Mennonite" has far more baggage than "quilts" regarding Jewish history. Though it's a far more subtle history and present than I'm sure you'd be interested in. The issue is really that Peretz's words are alienating some of us who have very long supported a great deal of what he has stood for through TNR. You simply have no idea of how incredibly hard it is to let go of TNR for someone with my respect for diversity. Tomorrow's phone call will be incredibly painful.

- timothycat

September 13, 2010 at 11:20pm

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A word of unasked for advice to timothycat--you sound like a nice guy-- no doubt worth everything you're paying for it. Don't cancel your subscription: just ignore Peretz if you need to. There's so much other great stuff going on here. Peretz need not cast such a long shadow over your enjoyment. Canceling just over him is like biting your subscription nose to spite your subscription face. Just sayin'.

- basman

September 13, 2010 at 11:31pm

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timothycat “@jdyer - if you knew your history you'd have known "cultural Mennonite" has far more baggage than "quilts" regarding Jewish history.” I don’t think of quilts as “baggage.” I also know about the Mennonite “baggage” as you call it. http://www.themennonite.org/bloggers/timjn/posts/A_window_into_Antisemitism_and_Nazism_among_Mennonite_in_North_America_Part_1 I also know that much of the Muslim world has a history vis-à-vis Jews and Israel that is not that dissimilar to that of the Mennonites and other Christian Churches. “Though it's a far more subtle history and present than I'm sure you'd be interested in. The issue is really that Peretz's words are alienating some of us who have very long supported a great deal of what he has stood for through TNR. You simply have no idea of how incredibly hard it is to let go of TNR for someone with my respect for diversity. Tomorrow's phone call will be incredibly painful.” I have no opinion on this. My point was that TNR has always had a small readership and you one more or less reader isn’t going to sink the ship. TNR has always published strong opinions and has offended some readers. That’s just how the publication works. You have to weight the good (diversity as you call it) against the bad (occasional offensive articles) and decide if you want to be a subscriber or not. You are not going to change the Mennonite past by subscribing (or ceasing to subscribe) to a pro Israel, pro Jewish magazine. I would hate to see Marty pull his punches in order to satisfy some of his readers.

- jdyer

September 13, 2010 at 11:39pm

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I left at around comment #65 and returned at #96 and I can't make head or tail of it. Ah well. I think Zavel's analogy was certainly antisemitic. He drew it out of his holster like a gun-slinger, practiced in the arts of drawing out the nearest gun his hand can reach. Why would such an analogy come to his mind right away, no pause to reflect upon suitability, applicability, and subject matter. Here are some Jews opining unfavourably upon Islam. How to shut them up? Bang. Jews and Wall street and greed. Unfailing combination and one that is sure to appeal. Eh, Zavel? It's not even subconscious antisemitism. "Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims...This is a statement of fact, not value." is not a parallel generalization to : "Jews are unprincipled and greedy, especially the ones who work on Wall Street. This is a statement of fact, not value." It just isn't. There is no element that can be compared, that can teach us anything. It is completely arbitrary. The author of this brilliant analogy meant to inflict injury, to arouse exactly the kind of response that he has. ____________________ And BTW, some enlightened Arabs are willing to face the truth: "In an August 6, 2008 column in the UAE daily Al-Ittihad, Dr. 'Abd Al-Hamid Al-Ansari, former dean of Islamic law at the University of Qatar and prominent liberal intellectual, attacked the Arab lawyers' unions for defending oppressors like Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir and Iraqi president Saddam Hussein while ignoring their victims in Darfur and Halabja. "The excuses and justifications offered today in defense of Al-Bashir and his policies are [the same as] those offered in defense of Saddam and his escapades, all of which were in vain. They repeat the same canned excuses, such as 'the politicization of standards of justice,' 'judging by a double standard,' 'justice biased against the Arabs,' 'selectivity,' and 'the service of American schemes.' The most recent of these accusations was expressed by one reader in Al-Ittihad, who said: 'What kind of international justice is this, that holds [Sudan] to account for a domestic crisis in Darfur that has lasted less than five years, while continuing its policy of turning a blind eye to the most heinous crimes in Palestine, which have lasted for 50 years?' "It is their right to defend Al-Bashir as they defended Saddam. And it is their right to demand universal international criminal standards and that they be applied in the case of anyone suspected of perpetrating similar crimes, as Dr. Saad Eddin Ibrahim says. But what these people always try to ignore is the victims. "We will not be hearing the voice of the Lawyers' Union, which mobilized to defend accused presidents, [speaking out] for the weak and the marginalized. ... It is the victims of Darfur and the millions of the crushed and pulverized who are most in need of the legal support of masses of lawyers." "... 300,000 people were killed in Darfur, and ... two million fled their homes after their villages were destroyed by the Sudan-backed Arab Janjaweed militias. Who is for them? Who is for the widows? Who is for the orphans? Who is for the displaced? "These victims are all Muslims, and their only offense is that they are not Arab, the ethnicity of their rulers! If they find no support among those who are supposed to defend rights and help the weak, then to whom can they turn for shelter and protection? Is the international community to be accused if it intervenes to extend a helping hand? "For five bloody years, the people of Darfur have been ruined and expelled, and the satellite television channels have broadcast horrific scenes that tormented the hearts of the world and make their consciences bleed - except for the Arab conscience, which was on vacation, and except for their [Arab] League, which remained comatose, and except for their media, which neglected to cover and broadcast the facts. " http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/2847.htm

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 12:22am

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As others have pointed out, and Kristof has in his blog, to make a general statement in absolute terms ("Muslim life is cheap, especially to Muslims) about a billion people is nothing but bigotry and a total failure to see people as individuals. If you were trying to say popular reaction to Muslim's killing other Muslims in certain countries has been less than it should be, you failed miserably and said something else entirely. This is a serious embarrassment to the New Republic, from a longtime faithful reader.

- MICRM

September 14, 2010 at 12:54am

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Noga: "I left at around comment #65 and returned at #96 and I can't make head or tail of it." Hallelujah! At least someone else feels bemused! I don't know what this thread has become either. I wish I had someone to blame. So, who the heck are you timothycat? I mean, hello and all that, it's not always like this around here and we like new people, but you picked an odd place to step into the stream.

- ironyroad

September 14, 2010 at 12:59am

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Seems to me that the arguments on these boards are often variations on the same theme. Marty or someone who shares his focus highlights an issue that concerns contemporary Islam's assault on the West or American values or Israel or worldwide Jewry. Someone is always quick to point out that the comment was too generalized to be useful, or unfairly critical of Islamfascists while giving other murderous psychopaths a free ride, or expressive of deep prejudices on the part of the editor-in-chief that betray fundamental American values and are an insult to the readership of this fine blog. Surely Islamic fascism with its millions slaughtered is a mere trifle compared to the egregious and unforgivable sin of discussing it inappropriately. What is it that gets into Marty sometimes? Surely the Muslim Brotherhood is no less respectful of human life than was the Khmer Rouge or the S.S. Why do we pick on them so unfairly?

- willjames77

September 14, 2010 at 4:05am

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Mr. Peretz is an incoherent buffoon whose backtracking should be taken with the same massive heaping of salt as his initial conclusions. The fact that he is actively employed by The New Republic, whose writers are among the finest I read, is truly perplexing to me. If you're going to be a hateful bigot who rambles through meaningless diatribes, at least stick with it. There's money in those gigs.

- tahirjon

September 14, 2010 at 4:11am

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>In these unusually inflamed days... I love this! So the plan is: 1. Pour gasoline on fire 2. Complain about heat 3. Repeat Palinesque!

- floydsm8

September 14, 2010 at 5:24am

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Willjames, literally no one is claiming that Peretz is "unfair to Islamic fascism." Rather, those who object do so because they believe that he is being too kind to Islamic fascism by conflating it with all of Islam.

- miceelf

September 14, 2010 at 5:46am

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Don't retreat, Peretz, reload!

- miceelf

September 14, 2010 at 5:47am

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"tahirjon: The fact that he is actively employed by The New Republic," Tee hee ..

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 7:07am

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"So, who the heck are you timothycat? " If only he were Timothy O'Connor! But that is one hope too far...

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 7:11am

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Precisely, willjames, as mice says, no one here is defending "Islamofascists." They are reacting to the conflation of Islamfascists with all of Islam, as in "contemporary Islam's assault on the West." Dhurtado

- NR143296

September 14, 2010 at 8:00am

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noga - Marty's conduct needs atonement, deal with it. Adding to mob mentality towards Americans is despicable, not despicable in comparsion to anything else - despicable period.

- WandreyCer

September 14, 2010 at 8:03am

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What are the parameters of Diversity? To what extents does it demand allegiance? How is it manifest on both existential plains of Individual and Collective? Are there rights?...... responsibilities?..... to the existential terrain?

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 8:03am

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What are the parameters of Diversity? To what extents does it demand allegiance? How is it manifest on both existential plains of Individual and Collective? Are there rights?...... responsibilities?..... to the existential terrain?

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 8:03am

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What are the parameters of Diversity? To what extents does it demand allegiance? How is it manifest on both existential plains of Individual and Collective? Are there rights?...... responsibilities?..... to the existential terrain?

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 8:04am

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Strange.... Strange..... Strange...... not my bad...... But am I responsible?........

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 8:05am

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"Adding to mob mentality towards Americans is despicable" I would have thought it's the "mob mentality" that is despicable. Embedded within your very objection on these grounds is your agreement with Marty's assessment. And another thing: where do you draw the line on what is to be suppressed in deference to Muslim "mob mentality"? You prevent yourself from noticing the internecine violence in the Islamic world which is pretty hard to dispute or conceal. How, then, are you going to address other types of anti-social values (like hatred for women, antisemitism, hatred for homosexuals)? How are you going to deal with these realities , help those who are really in need of your support? Your attitude is a mirror image of what you are complaining against. You claim Islam is too diverse and large to generalize about but then you generalize about Islam by objecting to any criticism of Islam and Muslims. An entire and very large segment of the world's population, with many links to other segments of world population, is to be awarded a special status! Shhh, let's not say anything that might insult them. You know what they are like.

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 9:08am

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And right on cue, a-propo mobs: http://mickhartley.typepad.com/blog/2010/09/highly-charged-mobs.html " Eighteen civilians were killed and 80 others wounded across Kashmir in a day of escalated violence intensified by anger over the desecration of the Holy Qur’an in US. A police officer was also killed during protests in Budgam after he was hit by a vehicle that then sped away. The day also saw gutting of two Christian missionary schools, several government buildings and two police vehicles by the irate mobs. Highly charged mobs took to the streets early morning on Monday defying a round-the-clock curfew to stage massive pro-freedom and anti-US protests leading to fierce daylong clashes with Indian security forces. People were inflamed after the Iranian state-run channel Press TV broadcast images of a small group of Christians ripping a copy of the Holy Book in Washington. Authorities quickly banned Press TV. The protesters chanted “Down with Qur’an desecrators,” and protest leaders denounced the desecration in speeches to the crowds. There were also shouts of “Down with America” and “Down with Israel” -- rarely heard in Kashmir, where anger is normally only directed at India."

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 9:31am

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jacko, perhaps your message was so important, it Needed To Be Repeated. ;-) I took Wandrey to be concerned that Peretz is adding to a mob mentality toward American Muslims by other Americans.

- miceelf

September 14, 2010 at 9:43am

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Jacko: "What are the parameters of Diversity? To what extents does it demand allegiance?" Speaking as a thoroughly "westoxified" immigrant who has not been able to even visit my birthplace for nearly thirty years, I can tell you that your first question is a constant struggle, both for the immigrant and the society in which s/he lives and to which s/he contributes (at a minimum economically, but possibly in other ways). We have many different models around the world, some work better than others - but it is impossible to determine whether a recipe that works in one society, will work in another. For this reason, you really do need to go back to first principles: "diversity" for what reason? Why "tolerance"? I know why I am here and why not elsewhere; I know in my bones what the value of "diversity" is - and this is why I am disturbed by the inflamed and uninformed blather that Peretz dribbles out of his pen. But what are your value structures in this respect? As to your second question, I know - I think, at least, I understand - where you are coming from ("allegiance to Western value structures, including non-violence and tolerance"), but bear in mind that that word is very loaded. This day and age, Obama's allegiance to the country that elected him as President is continuously questioned; anyone to the right of Dick Armey is required constantly to affirm and reaffirm allegiance to America. "Allegiance" is now not simply adherence to or belief in a common meta-value system, but accepting specific policy prescription for identified social ills. Your second question, in many contexts, is proxy not for unifying diversity, but for purifying exclusivity, and only you can tell which one of these you really meant. I was watching "A Man for All Seasons" again last night - I use passages in it to teach - and each time, at "I'll give benefit of the law to the devil, for my own safety's sake" brings tears to my eyes. I then think, if Marty can say casually that he would deny constitutional protections to a relatively sizeable minority, and if you would run around questioning people's national and cultural allegiances because of their religion, how wide would the circle be? My entire family is Baha'i; all our lives in Iran, our "allegiance" to the country my ancestors have lived in for 25 centuries was questioned because my parents' faith was considered incompatible with the value structure of the society in which we lived. Now, are we to go there in the West?

- icarusr

September 14, 2010 at 9:49am

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Folks. I'll be back a bit later as time allows. Just a couple quick thoughts. Is tolerance and diversity an exclusively Western value? Why? Is it an intellectual proposition? Rights? If so, why? or something else? This fight is about Truth. They're all loaded Words. Sorry to leave it at that but this it seems to me needs to be discussed. Not really the presumed stances of political figures. It starts and ends at home... in the heart.

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 10:03am

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Jacko, I guess I'd start with the Golden Rule. As a Christian, I don't want to be judged by the absolute worst members of my faith (I also don't want to be judged by the worst of my gender, or race, or political party). My assumption is naturally that this broad brush hurts other people as much as it hurts me. I don't want to be punished for whatever nonsense Fred Phelps comes up with; I in turn try to judge others by their own actions. Exclusively? I doubt it. But a necessary component? absolutely.

- miceelf

September 14, 2010 at 10:30am

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"Is tolerance and diversity an exclusively Western value? " (jacko) There have been a few models of co-habiting diversities in history. The Islamic world boasts of such a record. Slavoj Zizek gives it some credibility: "Regarding Islam, we should look at history. In fact, I think it is very interesting in this regard to look at ex-Yugoslavia. Why was Sarajevo and Bosnia the place of violent conflict? Because it was ethnically the most mixed republic of ex-Yugoslavia. Why? Because it was Muslim-dominated, and historically they were definitely the most tolerant. We Slovenes, on the other hand, and the Croats, both Catholics, threw them out several hundred years ago. This proves that there is nothing inherently intolerant about Islam. We must rather ask why this terrorist aspect of Islam arises now. The tension between tolerance and fundamentalist violence is within a civilisation." _____________ I was thinking that if we take into consideration what we know about Islamic regulations concerning minorities, this observation that "historically [Muslin rulers] were definitely the most tolerant" makes some sense. There was not an ongoing state of perpetual agitation and attrition of minorities and therefore violent confrontations and pogroms were relatively less common than in Christendom. Which led to a perception of harmony. But what kind of harmony and at what cost? Minority members knew who they were, in relation to the dominant majority, that they were legally bound by a set of laws and rules which dictated to them every nuance of their obligations, conduct and rights relative to the Muslim owners of the land. When your own inferiority is inscribed into law, and when you know that any breach of it may entail painful judgments, and maybe death, you are not likely to walk with your head held high when you pass your Muslim neighbour in the street. Nor are you likely to pursue justice in court when your Muslim partner cheated you, since by law, your testimony counted for half the value of your adversary's. When a system is slated against you, legally, you adjust your ways and expectations and forgive a multitude of insults, slurs and crimes committed against you. It is an excellently efficient way to maintain the "tolerance" of a bellicose majority.

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 10:51am

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Marty, Sometimes I have to apologize too. It is better not to err so grievously, but admitting when you are wrong is a very good thing too. On the whole, I think your attitude towards Muslims is sick, in the sense of being unhealthful, a malady of mind. Your apology should be a signal - a warning - a light in an otherwise dark place. Perhaps it is not too late to find a path towards a more enlightened point of view, before you are completely lost on this sad path of pathological distemper. I wish you well. Neil

- purcellneil

September 14, 2010 at 11:13am

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"Why? Is it an intellectual proposition? Rights? If so, why? or something else? " Yes, I think it is an intellectual proposition. What you see in Marty's expostulation and apology is not at all what icarsur describes as: "if Marty can say casually that he would deny constitutional protections to a relatively sizeable minority, and if you would run around questioning people's national and cultural allegiances because of their religion, how wide would the circle be?". Marty's expostulation and apology go in the very opposite direction of what icarusr would like us to believe (icarsur's antipathy to Marty is not a secret). I see it as a very natural trajectory from emotion to what you so cogently proposed "rights". Marty's initial contention "I wonder whether I need honor these people and pretend they are worthy of the privileges of the First Amendment, which I have in my gut the sense that they will abuse." was an expression of a genuinely emotional frustration Martha Nussbaum says: “I do not go about fearing any and every catastrophe anywhere in the world, nor (so it seems) do I fear any and every catastrophe that I know to be bad in important ways. What inspires fear is the thought of damages impending that cut to the heart of my own cherished relationships and projects. What inspires grief is the death of someone beloved, someone who has been an important part of one’s own life. This does not mean that the emotions view these objects simply as tools or instruments of the agent’s own satisfaction: they may be invested with intrinsic worth or value. They may be loved for their own sake, and their good sought for its own sake . . .. [Nonetheless], the emotions are in this sense localized: they take their stand in my own life, and focus on the transition between light and darkness there, rather than on the general distribution of light and darkness in the universe as a whole.” That's why "rights” exist. A person's, any person’s, right to happiness, safety and physical well-being cannot be dependent on our capacity to love him/her. When we no longer speak the language of love, we need automatically to switch to the language of rights. This is where our role as responsible agents kicks in. What happened in Marty's case is that, having succumbed to the emotion, he awakened to the wrongness of it, due to the fact that it could not be universally applied in justice for all. This is when he decided to offer an apology and an explanation. He realized that he had given in to a momentary emotional weakness which had to be rectified as soon as possible. He proceeded from emotional particularism to ethical universalism. That is wisdom. Same cannot be claimed for icasrur and his ilk, for all their yelling and shouting. Pretending universalism, THEY express nothing but raw, biased, one-directional emotionalism. Start with the knee-jerk antisemitic analogy and end with icarsur's lachrymose descent into narcissistic bathos.

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 11:24am

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Another Quran story: http://www.solomonia.com/blog/archive/2010/09/star-of-david-koran-violates-algerian-st/index.shtml

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 11:44am

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اما نكته حائز اهميت اين است كه در دنياي كنوني بيش از هر زمان ديگر اسلام در خطر است . امروز رفتارهاي طالباني بيشترين لطمه را به پيكره اسلام وارد نموده اند . كشتار زنان و كودكان بيگناه در اثر حملات انتحاري توسط كساني كه خود را منتسب به گروه هاي اسلامي ميكنند در عراق و افغانستان و پاكستان و ديگر نقاط جهان چهره اي زشت از اسلام به نمايش گذاشته است . رد پاي گروه هاي تند رو اسلامي در اقدامات تروريستي مانند فاجعه 11 سپتامبر لطمات جدي به عزت و اعتبار مسلمانان وارد نموده است . خرافه پروري در بسياري از كشورهاي اسلامي بويژه در كشور خودمان ايران چهره اي ضعيف از باورهاي اسلامي عرضه نموده است . ... دفاع نادرست ما از اسلام بزرگترين صدمات را به اين شريعت الهي وارد مينمايد . امروز آنچه در دنيا اتفاق ميافتد اسلام سوزي است آن هم نه به دست پيروان ديگر اديان بلكه توسط خود مسلمانان . امروز آنان كه آتش به خرمن اسلام ميزنند پيروان ديگر مذاهب نيستند و اين خرمن در ممالك غير مسلمان به آتش كشيده نميشود بلكه آتش بيار معركه اسلام سوزي مسلمانان ناآگاه متعصبي هستند كه دين خدا در آتش جهل و ناداني ايشان ميسوزد . چرا رگ هاي غيرت مسلمانان از اين اسلام سوزي ها متورم نميشود ؟ شعار قرآن سوزي يك مجنون متعصب به ظاهر مسيحي در آمريكا فريادمان را به آسمان ميبرد ولي سالهاست كه در اطرافمان اسلام سوزي ميشود و حريق دور دين رسول خدا را گرفته است و صدايي از كسي بلند نميشود و اگر هم ميشود با چوب و تازيانه خرافات و تك صدايي پاسخ داده ميشود ؟ راستي قرآن سوزي آن كشيش نادان مسيحي خطرناك تر است يا اسلام سوزي به ظاهر مسلمانان نادان متعصب ؟

"But the important point is that in today's world, Islam is more than ever in danger. Today, Talibanist actions have caused the biggest harm to Islam. The slaugher of innocent women and children in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere by suicide bombers who allege fidelity to Islamic principles demonstrates an ugly face of Islam. The involvement of radical Islamists in terrorist attacks such as the 9/11 tragedy has caused enormous damage to the place of Muslims in the world. Rampant superstition in many Islamic countries, but also in our own Iran, displays a rather weak perspective on Islamic beliefs. [...] Our misguided defence of Islam has caused the greatest damage to this divine faith. Today, what is going on in the world is the utter destruction of Islam, not by the hands of other believers, but by Muslims themselves. Today, those who throw gasoline on the fire burning Islam are not adherents of other religions or citizens of other countries, but rather, are none other than ignorant and prejudiced Muslims in their own homes ... Why is it that Muslims are not inflamed the world over by this self-destruction? A crazy fundamentalist purports to burn the Koran in the name of the Christian religion, and we scream to high heaven; for years, Islam has been burning in our own homes and not a peep arises out of anyone ... Truly, is Koran burning by an ignorant Christian pastor more dangerous to Islam, or the self-immolation of ignorant and prejudiced Muslims?"
http://www.rahesabz.net/story/23396/ (The website of the Green Movement of Iran's reformists.)

- icarusr

September 14, 2010 at 12:08pm

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Icarus is playing with himeself again. Masturbation is his favorite sport.

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 12:26pm

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It would easier to get a Nazi war criminal to acknowledge that he or she shouldn't hate Jews than to get miceelf and huratdo to admit that Islamicism is a threat and not a marginal phenomenon within Islam.

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 12:28pm

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jackson: I'll keep telling you that you are shooting yourself in the foot by resorting to this sort of ad-homs. I'm not even sure it merits being called ad-homs. You can bristle all you like but please give it a thought, OK? I don't want to have to go the way of all jerks to make you realize how unfair this is. Please STOP IT!

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 12:34pm

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Noga - Very funny George Constanza reference! Arab (fundamental) Islam is a violent society, which has spread to Africa as well. I wonder, however, if these same terrible manifestations plague all Islamic societies? e.g. Malaysia, Indonesia, Former Russian Stans? Ginzy - Regarding "Settler" violence, you remind me of back in 1994 just after Rabin's assasination, I still hadn't removed the ill-advised "Zo Artzeinu" bumper sticker on my car, and some very secular dudes with "Shalom Chaver" bumper stickers on their car surrounded my car at a traffic light and smashed dents galore while shouting "You killed Rabin". Fortunately, we have a strong judicial system and justice was served.

- streaming

September 14, 2010 at 12:40pm

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"Fitzgerald: Laurie Goodstein and the Times: Weighed, and found wanting" "Laurie Goodstein, who reports for The New York Times on Islam in America without, apparently, ever thinking she has a responsibility to study the texts and tenets of Islam, and to learn about, and be keenly aware of, the arts of Taqiyya and Tu-Quoque in which Muslim spokesmen are so well-versed so that she, too, may not be fooled, has done it again: given evidence of her journalistic malpractice." http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/09/fitzgerald-laurie-goodstein-and-the-times-weighed-and-found-wanting.html

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 1:05pm

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streaming "Noga - Very funny George Constanza reference!" who the fuck is George Constanza?

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 1:06pm

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I recommend for all Leon Weiselter's recent comment in TNR on this sort of thing. All major religions (Christian, Judaism, Islam, Confucionist) are religions of both peace and war.

- NR027810

September 14, 2010 at 1:06pm

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"who the fuck is George Constanza?" It was in reference to one of icarusr's earlier comments on this thread.

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 1:19pm

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"All major religions (Christian, Judaism, Islam, Confucionist) are religions of both peace and war." That's like saying all women are beautiful and ugly. But wouldn't you notice if one woman had a larger percentage of beauty while the other's irregular features were so dominant that one couldn't in all honesty refer to her beautiful features as meriting her being on par with the former?

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 1:23pm

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Wait- dyer doesn't know who George Costanza is, doesn't know about the connection between Jodie Foster and Ronald Reagan, apparently doesn't know what a "fox news" is, and *I'm* the one who's a foreign jihadi???

- miceelf

September 14, 2010 at 1:24pm

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it's actually more like saying all races contain beautiful and ugyly women.

- miceelf

September 14, 2010 at 1:25pm

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Ick. I admire the courage on the part of those who have put forth the statement you reference.

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 1:32pm

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"Truly, is Koran burning by an ignorant Christian pastor more dangerous to Islam, or the self-immolation of ignorant and prejudiced Muslims?"" You could re-write this statement in this way: "Frankly, Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims."

- noga1

September 14, 2010 at 1:43pm

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Noga. Interesting stuff from Martha. I'll abandon implied a priori arguments and put simply that it would at least appear through implication that the need for justice (rights) is due to our shortcomings ie. inability to fully love one another. This democratically distributed incapacity is made apparent by self knowledge and projected empathy. Yet we try to get within proximity through the effort of rights and justice. By my lights there is honor and truth in this bi-directional admission and commission. Empathy, Truth, the inconvenience of suffering Hypocrisy. No wonder everyone is and has been pissed at the Jews. First were those Commandments and then some Nutcase who said, " No way out is the only way out."

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 1:57pm

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"But repentance, prayer and righteousness avert the severe decree." L'shana tova.

- lfeinber@email.unc.edu

September 14, 2010 at 2:13pm

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miceelf "Wait- dyer doesn't know who George Costanza is, doesn't know about the connection between Jodie Foster and Ronald Reagan, apparently doesn't know what a "fox news" is, and *I'm* the one who's a foreign jihadi???" Why is the connection between Jodi Foster and Reagan important to know at this point in time? Reagan was the first President to send an Ambassador to the Vatican. Did you know that? Now, that is important. George Costanza doesn't matter. Am I missing something by not watching Fox news? There is more to this country than TV trivia. Too bad miceelf doesn’t know that. No wonder he has a benign view of Jihadists?

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 2:13pm

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Addendum: I want to make clear that I reference the 'Nutcase' in the most affectionate terms.

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 2:23pm

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I want to comment on Noga's interesting post of 09/14/2010 - 11:24am EDT. I think in that post she tended to rationalize the trajectory of Peretz's first statement taken up by Kristtof and his contrition. Her post caused me to think more about his apology. I for myself accept his apology as a public statement of what he thinks but on reflection still hold the comment he apologized for against him as evidence of the content of his soul. This goes to some of the complexity of apology and forgiveness generally, and the complication of that complexity created by the difference between what's public and what's private. have certain private biases, certain private terrible notions, certain things I feel that I'm ashamed to admit, certain beliefs and thoughts that, were to they be known, would rightly mark me up for extreme disapprobation. What do I do with this batch of darkness? I keep it to myself. I suppress it. I note what I can think through, despite what the worst of me harbors. And it is what I can think through that I go to the world with: whether that going is to those closest to me and who constitute the sum of my private life, or whether that going is to forums like this or to my professional activities or other similar impersonal destinations which make up the sum of my public life. Between those closest to me and those furthest from me is a scale of descending or ascending “keeping my guard up”, depending what end of the closest/furthest spectrum I move from. But, of necessity, even with those closest to me, I censor myself. We all do, some more than others. I keep to myself what I dare not reveal to anyone. Peretz is a peculiar instance of the fluidity and mingling in him of the public and private, and of his darknesses and his public comment. He's quick to say what’s on his mind and in his heart and he reveals himself a lot, too often, in fact, for his own good. That unfiltered candor is part of what makes his blog compelling--why so many in TNR universe are drawn to it and him. But that unfiltered candor, which he both conceptualizes and rationalizes as--his word—“vociferousness” allows us to see him as he relatively is. And what he relatively is, in his soul, consists in part of this: "I wonder whether I need honor these people and pretend they are worthy of the privileges of the First Amendment, which I have in my gut the sense that they will abuse." What we have in Peretz's apology is the illumination and working out of the blurring in him between private and public. Hence, in his indefensible statement he leads with his “gut”. It was not a one off uncontrollable blurting from some nether region. It was not a one off explosion of, as Noga would have it, frustration. How would she know? Rather, it was a piece of his animus against Muslims and Arabs as evident in his posting over the years, but a piece self evidently gone too, too far. Remarkably--as in worth remarking--Peretz's own sober second thought did not move him to see the error of his way. Rather it was the public accounting of him by way of Kristof taking him up on what Peretz said: “But in yesterday’s The New York Times, he quotes two sentences that I recently wrote—one of them genuinely embarrasses me, and I deeply regret it.” What is on display here is not a momentary lapse, frustrated intemperance exploding only to be regretted, which regret is to be understood and unreservedly accepted. Peretz wrote his thoughts for the world’s consumption in his publicly read blog after all. What, rather, is on display is the man’s worst angels taking flight, exposed to the light of day, and then scuttling back to the dark place they came from, the arc of their flight indelible on, inerasable from, the paper of the world. What is on display is the public working out of the fomenting of contemptible dark utterance and the shameful necessity of publicly thinking it through and making public amends. But the content of Peretz’s soul has been revealed. We have glimpsed past the curtains keeping unseen his darkness. And we know it. So one can accept—not unreservedly--his apology as an articulation of what he needs to go to the world with. We can see how he now chooses to comport himself publicly on these issues. But we will always know what is in his soul because what his “vociferousness” let out ought to have been nobody’s business, which is to say, what he really feels, what really abides in his gut.

- basman

September 14, 2010 at 2:31pm

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Basman: "Remarkably--as in worth remarking--Peretz's own sober second thought did not move him to see the error of his way." I actually missed this angle - but you're right of course. Incidentally, the statement to which you respond was deliberately misinterpreting, in plain sight, the point I had made earlier, which was in respect of Marty's Original Sin and quite manifestly not his "expostulation and apology." Beautifully done; thanks.

- icarusr

September 14, 2010 at 3:05pm

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Jacko: the point is, there are lots of people like that in the Muslim world. And these sentiments reflect not just Iran's reform movement, but also many in the conservative camp who see their religion identified solely with blood and guts on the asphalt. They reject the blood out of the same devotion that others use to spill it - it would be idiotic to assert that Islam is a religion of peace, and bigoted to suggest that all Muslims crave blood as a religious sacrament.

- icarusr

September 14, 2010 at 3:11pm

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In my next life, I'm going to marry Basman.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 14, 2010 at 3:23pm

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"French Senate votes to ban Islamic full veil in public " "The bill envisages fines of 150 euros for women wearing the full veil France's Senate has overwhelmingly approved a bill that would ban wearing the Islamic full veil in public." http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11305033

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 4:32pm

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Frankly, I was surprised to read Marty's apology. I suspect it was motivated by a combination of two factors: (1) the introspective pause to examine our personal failings which Judaism invites us to undertake during the New Year holidays, and (2) the assessment that the quote that Kristoff latched onto sounded ugly enough out of context that he needed to do some damage control. Marty's stinging assessment of Kristoff as a cheerleader for the self-flagellation crowd apparently got his attention. This was his payback, and Marty seems to have realized that he got caught with his pants down. As for the content of Marty's offensive statement, he should have been more careful in his phrasing, but the problem he highlights is and remains one for which we currently have no good answers. How can we maintain the framework of a liberal society when that framework itself is continually being used by the enemies of liberty to advance a totalitarian agenda? Here are some examples for those who need illustrations: - The right to freedom of speech is invoked by Muslim Student Union protestors who shout down the Israeli Ambassor at U.C. Irvine and prevent him from delivering his speech. - Freedom from desecration of one's religion is used to sue authors and block publication of books critical of Islam, otherwise known as "lawfare". - Freedom of religion is invoked to permit the building of mosques, even in places where an apparent triumphalist agenda is offensive to a majority of a local community. Hamas believed in the principle of free elections until it took power, as did the Nazis. Liberal democracies are not immune to subversion just because they have good laws. Anyone who thinks that these issues will resolve themselves, not to put too fine a point on it, simply has his head up his ass. The core issue is that the enemies of liberal society are systematically using its guarantees of liberty to undermine the system from within. This is, perhaps, a less offensive way to articulate Marty's gut feeling that certain people who are claiming First Amendment privileges have no real respect for freedom of speech. It's always so much easier to dump on Marty for his careless prose than to address the disturbing issues that he throws at his readers. Just for fun, here's a look at Muslims expressing their right to religious freedom in Italy during the early days the Gaza war: http://sheikyermami.com/2009/01/07/mario-borghezio-thousands-of-fanatical-muslims-praying-outside-milan-cathedral-is-an-act-of-intimidation-a-slap-in-the-face-for-the-city-of-milan/

- willjames77

September 14, 2010 at 4:44pm

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Willjames, the first amendment as regards freedom of speech doesn't lay down that the person speaking must hold a positive position as regards that right in the abstract. It would be nice to think that all share equally in our values, but it isn't the case. The Constititution has survived, however, most tests of that nature. If freedom of speech is denied to people who don't really believe in it, then it's not freedom of speech. It also happens during emotional political events that people get shouted down, not only at Irvine and not only Israeli ambassadors. Effective policing of events can mitigate this technique and as an extreme measure peristent hecklers can be forcibly ejected. In fact, I was on the other side of this argument a long time ago in London, where the fringe left had a "no free speech for fascists" principle. This meant, unfortunately, that people started to apply it generously (e.g. to moderate conservatives as well as to anti-immigration fanatics like Enoch Powell) and it disadvantaged the left by making us look as if we were fearful of debate when what we were against was the legitimizing of extreme rightwing views by inclusion. I was wrong, but I felt differently at the time. I'm older now. If people are purveying incitement to violence, let's observe that, and prosecute it if possible, by way of the FBI and law enforcement agencies. If they have dubious international connections, let the intel people sniff it out. If their finances are not in order, there's the IRS. But short of those methods, we can't police inside people's heads.

- ironyroad

September 14, 2010 at 5:01pm

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I wasn’t going to respond directly to Marty’s apology however, Basman’s long an overly poetic reading of that apology which was actually an attempt to deconstruct it by constructing a fanciful psychological portrait that misses the point of Marty’s comments: “What, rather, is on display is the man’s worst angels taking flight, exposed to the light of day, and then scuttling back to the dark place they came from, the arc of their flight indelible on, inerasable from, the paper of the world. What is on display is the public working out of the fomenting of contemptible dark utterance and the shameful necessity of publicly thinking it through and making public amends. But the content of Peretz’s soul has been revealed. We have glimpsed past the curtains keeping unseen his darkness. And we know it.” Basman Is this really what is “on display” in Marty’s comments above? Here is Marty in his own words: “Nicholas Kristof and I do not see the world—and America's role in it—in the same way. I have sometimes expressed my disagreements with his opinions vociferously (vociferousness is my business). But in yesterday’s The New York Times, he quotes two sentences that I recently wrote—one of them genuinely embarrasses me, and I deeply regret it.” Is this the writing of a man who in the overly dramatic words of basman is “working out of the fomenting of contemptible dark utterance and the shameful necessity of publicly thinking it through and making public amends…” Notice that Marty own comments were addressed to an individual (Kristof). Notice also that he begins by stating that there is a huge divide in the way they see the world. Notice next that Marty states that he has in the past expressed his disagreement with Kristoff “vociferously.” He also parenthetically says that “(vociferousness is my business).” Now, finally we come to the apology. “But in yesterday’s The New York Times, he quotes two sentences that I recently wrote—one of them genuinely embarrasses me, and I deeply regret it.” He apologizes (too hastily methinks) for one of the comments Kristof took him to task. “The embarrassing sentence is: "I wonder whether I need honor these people and pretend they are worthy of the privileges of the First Amendment, which I have in my gut the sense that they will abuse." I might have phrased it differently from the way Peretz did but the sentiment is not very different from what Justice Robert H. Jackson (echoing Lincoln said). The other sentence that “embarrassed” him was: "Frankly, Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims." This is a statement of fact, not value.” Marty then goes on to note that “In his column, Kristof made this seem like a statement of bigotry. But on his blog, he notes that he concurs with it. "Peretz makes some points that are valid, and I agree with him that Muslims haven’t said nearly enough about those Muslims who kill other Muslims—in Kurdish areas, in Iraq, in Western Sahara, in Sudan, and so on." “ Interestingly enough Marty Peretz’ interlocutor, Kristof, who took him to task for what he said, after reflecting on it himself, came to the same conclusion that “Muslims haven’t said nearly enough about those Muslims who kill each other.” I would also add that few commentators had over the years written more eloquently about the oppression of women in Muslims societies. Marty Peretz probably responded to Kristof because even though they disagree on many issues he respects him as a public intellectual. I don’t see Marty’s apology to be a “working out of the blurring in him between private and public” as Basman would have it, nor do I see the exposition of “his worse angels” or a revelation of some “dark” inner self? I am not sure I understand why the handwringing, and finger pointing on Basman’s part? His comment reads like a parody of some over the top melodrama and not a succinct or just assessment of Mr. Peretz’ comments above. basman “What we have in Peretz's apology is the illumination and working out of the blurring in him between private and public. Hence, in his indefensible statement he leads with his “gut”. It was not a one off uncontrollable blurting from some nether region. It was not a one off explosion of, as Noga would have it, frustration. How would she know? Rather, it was a piece of his animus against Muslims and Arabs as evident in his posting over the years, but a piece self evidently gone too, too far.” “Remarkably--as in worth remarking--Peretz's own sober second thought did not move him to see the error of his way. Rather it was the public accounting of him by way of Kristof taking him up on what Peretz said: “But in yesterday’s The New York Times, he quotes two sentences that I recently wrote—one of them genuinely embarrasses me, and I deeply regret it.” “

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 5:23pm

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Ick. I get what you are trying to say. I even have a degree of sympathy and respect for your allegiances and why you hold as you do. Still yet it doesn't change my basic description of the problem as I see it even as you are trying to speak to it. I'm efforting to some clarity on the basic psycho/spiritual reality.

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 5:37pm

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The US is not England, and not allowing an invited guest to speak at a public gathering is against the regulations of most educational institutions, Irony.

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 5:50pm

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Noga - I am not preventing myself from noticing or judging anything in the Islamic world. There is plenty to disagree with and be digusted with there. That is an irrelevent smokescreen. It has nothing at all to do with Marty's despicable behavior towards fellow Americans and I have to think you know that. The mob mentality I speak of, as you know, is the rising tide of mindless bigotry directed towards Muslim Americans, which Marty threw fuel on from his bigoted sewer pit of a mindset. Atacking the Constitutional rights of peaceful Americans based on their religion is objectively wrong. It is you who is being opportunistic by ignoring the objective reality of: Morality 101: making hateful generalizations and attacking people solely based on their religion is bigotry. Simple. You seem to be unable to accept this and try to make it in to a global issue out of ideological convenience. You refuse to see the specifics because they don't suit your own bias against Muslims.

- WandreyCer

September 14, 2010 at 5:59pm

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Funny about shifting boundaries. The Muslim haters want to pull in examples from all over the world, mostly countries that bear no resemblance at all to the US, when they want to justify their absolute hatred of Muslims and their arguments that Muslims are simply a lower form of life than human beings. And yet, when something inconvenient comes up, "oh, [country X] isn't the US"

- miceelf

September 14, 2010 at 6:13pm

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miceelf "Funny about shifting boundaries. The Muslim haters want to pull in examples from all over the world, mostly countries that bear no resemblance at all to the US, when they want to justify their absolute hatred of Muslims and their arguments that Muslims are simply a lower form of life than human beings. And yet, when something inconvenient comes up, "oh, [country X] isn't the US"" The Jew hater miceelf is writing about what I said to Irony which had to do with the censoring of pro Israel speakers at US colleges and nothing to do with Muslims. They guy is deranged.

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 6:40pm

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miceelf "Funny about shifting boundaries. The Muslim haters want to pull in examples from all over the world, mostly countries that bear no resemblance at all to the US, when they want to justify their absolute hatred of Muslims and their arguments that Muslims are simply a lower form of life than human beings. And yet, when something inconvenient comes up, "oh, [country X] isn't the US"" The Jew hater miceelf is writing about what I said to Irony which had to do with the censoring of pro Israel speakers at US colleges and nothing to do with Muslims. That guy is deranged.

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 6:42pm

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"The mob mentality I speak of, as you know, is the rising tide of mindless bigotry directed towards Muslim Americans" Am I missing something here?..... Did I miss out on the examples of this rising tide of mindless bigotry? I think the US has acquitted itself quite well in our collective conversations especially under the circumstances.

- jacko

September 14, 2010 at 7:00pm

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That's exactly it, JD. If speakers are heckled to the extent of causing the meeting to collapse, there are possible counter-measures (think: campus police) and I would say myself that colleges and universities could be a bit more robust in applying them. My point about England was simply to underline that shouting-down can happen in places where nothing about Israel or Muslims is at issue. Presumably you don't dispute that as a matter of fact. Or do you? I'm increasingly confused as to what people are thinking or saying on this thread.

- ironyroad

September 14, 2010 at 7:07pm

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ironyroad "That's exactly it, JD. If speakers are heckled to the extent of causing the meeting to collapse, there are possible counter-measures (think: campus police) and I would say myself that colleges and universities could be a bit more robust in applying them. My point about England was simply to underline that shouting-down can happen in places where nothing about Israel or Muslims is at issue. Presumably you don't dispute that as a matter of fact. Or do you? I'm increasingly confused as to what people are thinking or saying on this thread." I was thinking about Israel in the context of American campuses and not England, though I have read on British web sites such as Engage that there too pro Israle speakers are not being allowed to speak in some places. I agree that "If speakers are heckled to the extent of causing the meeting to collapse, there are possible counter-measures (think: campus police) and I would say myself that colleges and universities could be a bit more robust in applying them."

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 7:16pm

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Marty Peretz, thank you for the apology. And icarusr (second person to post a comment), thank you for being quick to post your thoughts on why the apology was insufficient. To icarusr's explication of Peretz' offensive "especially," it must be added that the original blog post had "most notably" in place of "especially." "Most notably" is worse, because it allows for the sense, "Muslim life may be equally cheap in the eyes of everyone, but Peretz finds its cheapness for Muslims themselves worthy of note." In contrast, a more natural interpretation of the same sentence with the redaction, "especially," as icarusr points out, is "Muslim life is even cheaper in the eyes of Muslims than it is in the eyes of others." Rewriting an offensive statement is not a substitution for apology, and is not worthy of you, Mr. Peretz. All the same, if you were only going to allow yourself to apologize for one thing, it is good you apologized for musing in print that perhaps first amendment rights should not be extended to Muslims.

- Ambrose

September 14, 2010 at 9:41pm

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I have never seen a post by anyone named Ambrose, here, so my phony detector tells me that this poster is cover for someone who posts here under another name. Now, since he singles out Icarus (harem boy) for praise I assume that Ambrose and he are no strangers to each other. (Could they be identical twins? No matter.) He (they) make the same error when he (they( say: “And icarusr (second person to post a comment), thank you for being quick to post your thoughts on why the apology was insufficient.” Well, Marty never apologized for saying that "… Muslim life is cheap, especially for Muslims." So, his (their) taking Marty to task for an “insufficient” apology when there was no apology in the first place is senseless. The rest of the post with its tortured prose makes even less sense.

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 9:58pm

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"Islamism, Unveiled: From Berlin to Cairo and Back Again" Paul Berman, Jeffrey Herf, and Marc Lynch "DECODING DOUBLE TALK" http://www.foreignaffairs.com/print/66689?page=show

- jdyer

September 14, 2010 at 11:33pm

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We are in the US, not in Berlin or Cairo. And it's always rather rich to see dyer speculate about the possiblity of sockpuppetry, given that he is closer to Peretz than the proverbial bacterial commensal.

- miceelf

September 14, 2010 at 11:42pm

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a different view on the same concept from Berman, Herf, Lynch (thanks jackson):http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/islam-islamism-and-moderation/?singlepage=true "Islam, Islamism, and Moderation: What, exactly, is the difference?" David Solway I would add to Solway's essay the suggestion to Muslims living as minorities in countries like the United States, France, Netherlands...the contribution of Samuel of Nehardea to the early Jewish diaspora: "The law of the land is law". Adaptation to the civil laws of the place you are living in is one element of moderation. 80 USD to renew TNR. THAT requires a different apology... still in recovery from voting in New York City - a new low of incompetence...

- K2K

September 15, 2010 at 12:12am

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It's ok K2K, voting is ultimately about values, not competence. I'm sure you were more competent than you think! :)

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 12:25am

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""The law of the land is law". Adaptation to the civil laws of the place you are living in is one element of moderation." That makes sense.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 12:26am

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You might be interested in this also: "Lost in Translation: A Ramallah man struggles to find a reading public for Maimonides" http://www.tabletmag.com/news-and-politics/44879/lost-in-translation-2/

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 12:28am

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miceelf "And it's always rather rich to see dyer speculate about the possiblity of sockpuppetry, given that he is closer to Peretz than the proverbial bacterial commensal." yes, I am just a bacterial puppet. Better that than being a low life PR man for 'Jihadrist, Inc,' as miceelf is.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 12:30am

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..In my next life, I'm going to marry Basman.. I've already called the caterer.

- basman

September 15, 2010 at 12:52am

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....But in yesterday’s The New York Times, he quotes two sentences that I recently wrote—one of them genuinely embarrasses me, and I deeply regret it.... "On one view of the difference between shame and embarrassment, shame does not necessarily involve public humiliation while embarrassment does, that is, one can feel shame for an act known only to oneself but in order to be embarrassed one's actions must be revealed to others. Shame may carry the connotation of a response to something that is morally wrong whereas embarrassment is the response to something that is morally neutral but socially unacceptable."

- basman

September 15, 2010 at 1:10am

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"...embarrassment is the response to something that is morally neutral but socially unacceptable." Only the weak-minded can be embarrassed for reasons that have nothing to do with genuine shame. Some people can be embarrassed by the fact that they had come from a working class family, some people can be embarrassed for wearing the same dress as another in the same posh event, some people can be embarrassed into rhinocerism for not conforming with mainstreams opinions. I don't think we care much for such people. To be embarrassed out of recognition that what you said was wrong does take some strength of character and even courage. Even if the realization was the result of someone else clarifying it for you. I think basman's little analysis about the difference between shame and embarrassment is meant to serve as proof that Marty is not genuinely sorry for his expostulation. I think he, basman, is wrong in this. I think Marty genuinely regrets having spoken so irresponsibly and is trying to make amends. That people here are scoffing at his efforts is puzzling at best. Some of the same people have gone out of their way to justify Imam Rauf's comments about America or Israel. To me it shows that their moral outrage is highly selective. Though I wouldn't call it hypocritical. There is a line of logic that runs from defending the Imam's positions to the insistence on vilifying Marty. The position is the bastard offspring of the much derided idea of "my country, right or wrong". In this case it is "Muslims and Islam, right or wrong". A person apologizes and you people throw it back in his face. This hardly suggests a particularly generous or compassionate motivation. It suggests vindictiveness and rigidity, a refusal to be mollified and an insistence on reading the worst into another's character despite the presence of evidence to the contrary. Marty's apology was a new element introduced into the conversation yet instead of inspiring some reflection and re-adjustment of positions, it was used in order to pile on the invective. Well, I'm not too worried. Soon anyone of the vilifiers will trip up and misspeak and by the same standard that you judged you will be judged.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 7:01am

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Basman, your post on 9/14 at 2:30 - that caused Molly to swoon - was simply brilliant. Icarus - thank you for the post from Iran!

- WandreyCer

September 15, 2010 at 8:28am

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basman ....But in yesterday’s The New York Times, he quotes two sentences that I recently wrote—one of them genuinely embarrasses me, and I deeply regret it.... "On one view of the difference between shame and embarrassment, shame does not necessarily involve public humiliation while embarrassment does, that is, one can feel shame for an act known only to oneself but in order to be embarrassed one's actions must be revealed to others. Shame may carry the connotation of a response to something that is morally wrong whereas embarrassment is the response to something that is morally neutral but socially unacceptable." ....But in yesterday’s The New York Times, he quotes two sentences that I recently wrote—one of them genuinely embarrasses me, and I deeply regret it.... "On one view of the difference between shame and embarrassment, shame does not necessarily involve public humiliation while embarrassment does, that is, one can feel shame for an act known only to oneself but in order to be embarrassed one's actions must be revealed to others. Shame may carry the connotation of a response to something that is morally wrong whereas embarrassment is the response to something that is morally neutral but socially unacceptable." Basman you borrowed the contrast between shame and embarrassment from an article in wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shame#Shame_vs._guilt_and_embarrassment The review article also says that: “Another view of shame and embarrassment says that the two emotions lie on a continuum and only differ in intensity” which makes more sense to me. Both are social emotions and not private ones. In any case, I still don’t see and you haven’t shown why Marty ought to apologize for what he wrote. That he acknowledges embarrassment for what he wrote tells me that he cares for the opinions of Kristof and nothing else.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 8:37am

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Jacko - So burning Qurans, marching on 9/11 at Ground Zero with hate signs directed towards Muslims (not just at the proposed community center, which is hateful enough), physical and verbal attacks, FOX News hysteria and bald-faced lies directed at the Park51 Imam, defacing peeing upon graffiti at several Mosques in my area alone, the gutter-esque bigoted excretia coming from Newt Gingrich and many very prominent evangelicals and right wing politicians, calling the President of the United States a secret Muslim as an epitaph, Marty's escalating bilge - etc etc etc etc etc etc is not a rising tide of bigotry towards Muslims? If this isn't what is? Maybe this all seems sedate to you, but not to me. Its disgusting and quite overt. Bigots *always* feel entitled to their bigotry.

- WandreyCer

September 15, 2010 at 8:40am

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"That people here are scoffing at his efforts is puzzling at best. Some of the same people have gone out of their way to justify Imam Rauf's comments about America or Israel." Hypocrisy and ignorance guides the views of most Marty Peretz haters. I exclude Basman from this charge since I don't see him as Marty hater. Does anyone here really think that Rauf and his ilk feel either shame or embarrassment for what they said about Israel?

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 8:42am

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These people would have been run out of New York by pissed off New Yorkers a year ago - http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/15/english-soccer-hooligans-at-ground-zero/?partner=rss&emc=rss

- WandreyCer

September 15, 2010 at 8:43am

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Does Al-Yaqoubi et al feel shame or even embarrassment by the following? “Muhammad Al-Yaqoubi, the GPU and “Community Cohesion”” habibi, September 14th 2010, 3:30 pm “Here is a message from the chairman of the “Global Peace and Unity” (GPU) conference, Mohamed Ali Harrath: The GPU offers a crucial platform for interfaith dialogue and exchange of ideas towards fostering mutual understanding between people from every faith and background in a bid for greater community cohesion. This is funny coming from a man who says that Jews control the media and America. Not to mention the fact that GPU speakers include Shady Alsuleiman, a promoter of al Qaeda preacher and recruiter Anwar Al-Awlaki, and grotesque antisemite Zaghloul Al-Naggar. Syrian preacher Muhammad Al-Yaqoubi is another scheduled speaker at the event. During the Mohammed cartoons controversy, he made his own views on “community cohesion” perfectly clear: freedom of expression must go. This is why the West now has more courage, especially with these wrong and false ideals like freedom of religion’ or ‘freedom of expression’. In Islam I do not allow under the banner of ‘freedom of expression’ someone to come and curse or insult a Prophet of Allah (swt). … Now the West has crossed every red line in respect of norms and ethics and I don’t think Muslims should tolerate this. If you’re asking me about how to react, how to respond, I believe we should show the highest angry level of response. We should tell the West that this is a red line you can never cross. When someone comes to claim God on Facebook, as happened recently, or when someone comes to call for the drawing of Rasulullah on Facebook, the government where Facebook is registered should have rules and limitations on the ‘freedom of expression’, and the same in Denmark. … Denmark isn’t really a big country, and so we could have taught the West a great lesson, and every other country, that we don’t fear any country that follows the same pattern and that they will get the same treatment from the Islamic world.” Read it all: http://hurryupharry.org/2010/09/14/muhammad-al-yaqoubi-the-gpu-and-community-cohesion/

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 8:47am

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WandreyCer "These people would have been run out of New York by pissed off New Yorkers a year ago -" They are scum and I don't see anyone endorsing them unlike the Islamists who are being ensorsed by large numbers of leftists who make excuses for them.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 8:51am

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I suspect that the only reason WandreyCer is interested in these soccer thugs is because they have the Israeli flag there. But he should lean a bit about soccer fans: "Today, Britain is awash with hatred of Jews carried in by followers of radical Islam who have found a congenial home in which to preach their genocidal doctrines. British soccer fans -- where so many of the country's violent dregs are concentrated -- have never been shy about giving voice to neo-Nazi slogans. Anti-Semitic incidents in the first six months of 2009 alone -- vandalism, hate mail, and direct violent attacks on Jews – already exceeded the entire number for 2008 and reached a level not seen since such statistics began to be compiled in 1984. Both the soccer hooligans, the Muslim fanatics, and the perpetrators of violence are situated on the fringe. In the post-World War II era, the British establishment was resistant to the most blatant forms of a prejudice severely discredited by the scope of German atrocities committed in its name. To the extent it remained visible, it typically took the form of phantasmagorical demonization of the state of Israel." http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/9215

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 9:07am

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Noga. I'm impressed with the fine shave which you have administered to the concept of hypocrisy. "Selective moral outrage" It accomplishes a vouchsafe for intellectual distinctions as holding station against the ' diminishing aspects of implied universal relativism '. I'll give a nod to a degree of validity in that direction. As you may have gathered I'm a big fan of the concept of hypocrisy. I see it as a useful engine for social/spiritual progress. Guilt can be a good thing provided a conviction born of intellectual honesty. More often than not, though, the most readily apparent product of unremitting guilt is virulent and perverse in a very determined denial.

- jacko

September 15, 2010 at 9:09am

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“Hypocrisy is the homage that vice pays to virtue.” ROCHEFOUCAULD

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 9:21am

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A man who moralises is usually a hypocrite, and a woman who moralises is invariably plain. - Oscar Wilde

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 9:28am

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Noga - Plain? I like that quote. Thank you. Oscar Wilde was the best. I notice you didn't respond at all to my list of anti-Muslim activities, of course. You're being intellectually lazy because you have nothing else to say and except for this topic, it is beneath you. Go ahead, just say it out loud and proud: I disagree with WandreyCer, therefore she is an anti-semite. Resorting to lazy, knee-jerk lies and bullying says nothing about me at all, only the utter emptiness of your statements such as they are. Although I like your fun, pithy, irrelevant (and often projection defined) quotes, please do keep them coming. You don't imtimidate me with your lies in the least - lie away.

- WandreyCer

September 15, 2010 at 9:56am

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"You don't imtimidate me with your lies in the least - lie away." What lies?

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 10:02am

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Until you respond to my list of Muslim-bashing, I think I'll ignore your questions too. Besides, anyone who resorts to calling someone an anti-semite instead of responding coherently and maturely is beneath contempt. Here's a quote that I find suits YOU Noga, although you project this on to everyone who you disagree with: "When we blindly adopt a religion, a political system, a dogma, we become automatons. We cease to grow.” Anais Nin

- WandreyCer

September 15, 2010 at 10:08am

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Until you respond to my list of American Muslim-bashing, and why that is unique and new, I think I'll ignore your questions too. Besides, anyone who resorts to calling someone an anti-semite instead of responding coherently and maturely is like talking to my six year old. Nya nya. So lame. My point with the hooligans was not about any flag (I don't know what the Israeli flag looks like offhand, although I should - thank you) it was that a year ago, like I said and you ignored, these people would have been run out of town in New York. The original point was that Muslim-bashing in the US is exploding. Not that I'm a fan of religion, I'm not, but this makes me think of you, using religion for your own special cake - “Religion is meant to be bread for daily use, not cake for special occasions.” Ben Franklin or "Anyone who says religion has nothing to do with politics knows nothing about religion." Gandi

- WandreyCer

September 15, 2010 at 10:18am

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Oops - extra quotes there for you Noga - but if all you have is name calling, just don't even bother. I already have a six year old, thanks. I like your quotes though. They don't insult me because you're wrong about me, but I do love your vast knowledge of so many things. I always learn from you when you're not resorting to name calling. I should remember that too I suppose, speaking of atonement. Your quotes are always great, historical references too.

- WandreyCer

September 15, 2010 at 10:21am

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WandreyCer: "Go ahead, just say it out loud and proud: I disagree with WandreyCer, therefore she is an anti-semite." WandreyCer: "... anyone who resorts to calling someone an anti-semite instead of responding coherently and maturely is beneath contempt." WC calls herself an antisemite and then accuses me of calling her an antisemite. Hmm. Coherence, in this case, seems to be a state of mind and not necessarily a logical correspondence between text and meaning. ______________ "(I don't know what the Israeli flag looks like offhand," Now THAT I find extremely hard to believe. _________________ Quoting Gandhi to a Jew is not the best tactics: "The calculated violence of Hitler may even result in a general massacre of the Jews by way of his first answer to the declaration of such hostilities. But if the Jewish mind could be prepared for voluntary suffering, even the massacre I have imagined could be turned into a day of thanksgiving and joy that Jehovah had wrought deliverance of the race even at the hands of the tyrant. For to the godfearing death has no terror. It is a joyful sleep to be followed by a waking that would be all the more refreshing for the long sleep. " (Gandhi) "Louis Fisher, Gandhi’s biographer asked him: “You mean that the Jews should have committed collective suicide?” Gandhi responded, “Yes, that would have been heroism.” ________________ "In his 1949 “Reflections on Gandhi,” George Orwell, regarding the late war, wrote that “one question every pacifist had a clear obligation to answer was: ‘What about the Jews? Are you prepared to see them exterminated? If not, how do you propose to save them without resorting to war?’” Orwell recorded Gandhi’s answer, which was: German Jews should commit collective suicide." ________

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 10:37am

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Wandrey- Good analysis and I like YOUR quotes also. As to your link, several thoughts: 1) "english soccer hooligans" has to be one of the most generous headlines ever. They're fascists, plain and simple and motivated and joined by hatred, right now for Muslims and for anyone who they think might be a muslim. Soccer hooliganism has little to do with it. 2) That's probably the only time you'll ever see an israeli flag from them in any kind of positive context. Like most British fascists (and, indeed, fascists the world over, be they British, American, German, Polish, Arab) hate Jews at least as much as they hate their named group of choice. So it ever was. My own suspicion?: those morons probably don't even know they're waving an Israeli flag, they just borrowed random images they saw from the American anti-mosque protestors.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 10:42am

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Jacko: I'd love to exchange ideas about hypocrisy. It's a subject I've been mulling over for many years. There is Arendt's view that hypocrisy is the vice of vices: "As witnesses not of our intentions but of our conduct,we can be true or false, and the hypocrite's crime is that he bears false witness against himself. What makes it so plausible to assume that hypocrisy is the vice of vices is that integrity can indeed exist under the cover of all other vices except this one. Only crime and the criminal, it is true, confront us with the perplexity of radical evil; but only the hypocrite is really rotten to the core." and then there is Proust who suggests that social hypocrisy (flattery) is a desirable element in a social context: " Indeed, the audience of Augustin the sayer of truths is quite extensive. This audience, misled by the conventional psychology of the theatre and the absurd maxim, ‘who loves well chastises well’ refuses to recognize that flattery is sometimes merely an overflow of affection and frankness the foam and slobber of a bad mood. Does Augustin exercise his spite on a friend? His audience draws a vague mental contrast between Roman rough justice and Byzantine hypocrisy, and they all exclaim with proud gesture, their eyes lit by jubilation at feeling themselves to be morally better, more down to earth, altogether rougher and tougher. ‘He’s not someone to spare your feelings out of affection!…. Let’s honour him: what a true friend….” From: Pleasures and Days, by Marcel Proust Is the double standard always hypocrisy? After all, we deny our children the right to drink whiskey while we drink it ourselves. That, too, is a double standard. But is it hypocrisy?

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 10:54am

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Noga, we all enjoy things that we don't necessarily want our children to enjoy--at least not too early in life. I think it's okay to ask our children to respect rules and behaviors that we ourselves don't always live up to. It provides some moral orientation for them, along with the lesson that even perfect people like one's parents may occasionally fall short. This kind of hypocrisy doesn't really trouble me. What causes me to lose sleep is the sense I have that really nice people like WandreyCer see no danger at all in militant Islam and believe that Islamophobia is a much, much bigger problem. If only we could get past our prejudices, we could all live in peace, just like the nice folks in affluent, liberal neighborhoods who have been able to overcome their own prejudices in such an admirable way. It's the combination of ignorance and moralism that convinces such people that they are enlightened and worthy role models. Unlike racists and alarmists like us who blow things all out of proportion instead of building bridges and demonstrating our good intentions so that we can heal our differences. I remember my mother telling me that, after the Germans began their invasion of Poland, some of the more sophisticated Jews tried to reassure their less worldly brethren that fears of the Nazis were exaggerated. Germany, after all, was the country of Goethe and Schiller and could never sink to such barbarism, bombastic rhetoric aside. There seems to be some part of the psyche that is terribly unwilling to see and respond to genocidal threats. The general response on the part of the liberal left to the Islamists' open declaration of war is to assume that it must be due to something we did that upset them. A fundamental misconception which the Islamists do their best to reinforce. I'm ready for some whisky before I sit down to my truffle risotto this evening.

- willjames77

September 15, 2010 at 11:53am

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Willjames, you keep attributing this view to others that there is "no danger in militant Islam" Do you actually believe that anyone here thinks there is no danger in militant islam? The various other misattributions to others flow from this initial misattribution. What most people here you disagree with (Wandrey included) are saying is not that there's no threat from militant Islam, or that if we were nicer everyone would like us. Rather, the point is a pretty simple one: not all Muslims subscribe to militant Islam, and to assume they are is wrong. That's very different than your (parody?) above. To take another analogy: I think it's wrong to assume that every young African American man is a criminal. This doesn't mean that I don't believe ANYONE is a criminal, or that there would be no crime if people weren't racist. Just that I think the generalization is wrong. I think I have mentioned this to you before and you didn't reply, and appear to instead insist on this straw man that literally no one believes. Help me out here. Try addressing what people are actually saying, not the various things that NO ONE is saying. There are, literally, an infinite number of silly ideas that no one here has.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 12:04pm

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09/15/2010 - 12:25am EDT | ironyroad: It's ok K2K, voting is ultimately about values, not competence. I'm sure you were more competent than you think! :) irony: I was referring to the incompetence of the Board of Elections. An official poll watcher grabbed my ballot to read it, then inserted it in the scanner upside down. FAILURE! Three more tries by the official poll watcher, and I finally retook my no longer secret ballot, which scanned successfully on my first try. I was already angry that the nominees for the Democratic primary were NOT LISTED IN ALPHABETICAL order, but the Machine favorites were in position one, then the other candidates were in ALPHABETICAL ORDER. I never felt like my vote had been devalued. I also now feel completely betrayed by the New York Democratic Party. They ran a totally inexperienced Rivera who beat the incumbent Espada for State Senate. Two other good challengers were muscled out to make way for Rivera. Why? Because they (Democratic Machien) think only an Hispanic last name can win in this district, preferably Rivera, a different family that already has three members in the Assembly and more family members in assorted other elected offices from the Bronx. This is the same Democratic Machine that begged me to support the previous incumbent against Espada in 2008. An incumbent (Gonzalez) who was already under indictment, now serving his time in prison. Hypocrites who deserve to lose on November 2 before New York declares bankruptcy under 100% Democratic control. I do not want an Attorney General who thinks gun control is the #1 problem in New York. I would never vote for Andrew Cuomo for governor - his father is the former governor who created the mountains of debt attached to the shadow public Authorities. We shall just have to see if enough not-flaming-liberal New Yorkers finally get out and vote on Nov. 2. The horror stories about the new scanners and utter incompetence of the Board of Elections means many people will continue to sit home rather than get stressed out by NO SECRET BALLOT style voting.

- K2K

September 15, 2010 at 12:25pm

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miceelf "Wandrey- Good analysis and I like YOUR quotes also." I agree with wondercey therefore she is great, quote miceeelf the Islamist PR man online.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 12:45pm

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WandreyCer you do have a history of hysterical Israel bashing in the name of morality. You have toned it down lately but your first posts here a few years back were full of self pity, moral rectitude and Israel hatred.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 12:46pm

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Will: "is the sense I have that really nice people like WandreyCer see no danger at all in militant Islam" I'll let Wand respond for herself - but your mention of Germany and the Nazis and Poland and so on requires a rejoinder. Neither Wand, nor anyone who has posted here in respect of Marty's despicable bigotry, has ever said that there is "no danger at all in militant Islam", or has sought to down weapons and tools to sit down across the negotiating table with bin Laden; no one is suggesting to give up today's version of the Sudentenland or to forsake "people of whom we know nothing in a far away land". Your assertion is, if made in good faith, a mistaken understanding of the whole discussion, at least on this thread. The point, for the sake of clarity, may be summarised as follows: First, "Islam" as a religion, "Muslims" as its adherents and the Koran as their holy book are fairly complex with a sometimes-rich and otherwise difficult history; they are not readily reducible to caricaturised simplifications (the redundancy is deliberate), no matter how many times we drag in links to MEMRI about violence here and there in Muslim communities. Second, within Islam, there are fundamentalist strands (which may or may not be violent - Iran's most fundamentalist Shi'a clergy eschewed involvement in the secular world for a century before the Revolution), there are violent strands (not all of which are fundamentalist - the MKO, Iran's biggest and deadliest Islamic terrorist group, were largely inspired by Leninist thought), there are deeply mystical strands, and then there are the masses, who go about their lives without giving much thought to any of the above - and they are probably in the hundreds of millions. To conflate, as so many do, all of these into one basket, and then to suggest that thoughts of reconciliation with the main body must necessarily be the same as conceding the ground to the violent fringes, could be considered intellectually lazy. Third, the comparisons to Nazi Germany are getting tiresome. It is possible to overlearn from history. Not every kook operating in the mountains of Afghanistan with claims of world conquest and about 4000 dead to his name is Hitler, or even Mussolini; not every negotiation with the enemy is "appeasement"; indeed, not every appeasement is "appeasement". Please, let us retire this tired trope and analyse the facts as they are. Fourth, at the end of the day, what do you propose? All out war with 1.2 billion Muslims? Annihilation of the Arabs? Closing our borders to dark-skinned folks? Bonfires for the Koran? You will not win over the Muslims by constantly telling them that their faith is nothing but female mutilation, stoning, honour killings and beheading; you will not quell Islamist fanaticism by rejoicing in the conversion of this or that Muslim intellectual to Christianity. No one here underestimates the danger of fanaticism, but we are seeking ways of dealing with it that do not include either global war or giving up our soul, as Marty would have us do (his non-apology notwithstanding). We need to hope that there are others like the Iranian intellectual I cited, and agree that he manages, in his own faith, find precisely the peace that we expect him to have - and help him convince his fellow believers of the same.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 12:52pm

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There is anti-Muslim activity in this country and there is also anti Jewish activity in this country on the part of Muslims. How many Muslims have been targeted and killed in the US, How many Jews and people thought to be Jews have been killed by Muslims in the US? Answer these questions Wandrey.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 12:56pm

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Partial list of people killed by Muslims in the US /26/1993 USA New York, NY 6 1040 Islamic terrorists detonate a massive truck bomb under the World Trade Center, killing six people and injuring over 1,000 in an effort to collapse the towers. 3/1/1994 USA Brooklyn, NY 1 0 A Muslim fires on a vanload of Jewish boys, killing one. 3/23/1997 USA New York, NY 1 6 A Palestinian leaves an anti-Jewish suicide note behind and travels to the top of the Empire State building where he shoot seven people in a Fedayeen attack. 4/3/1997 USA Lompoc, CA 1 0 A prison guard is stabbed to death by a radical Muslim. 3/17/2000 USA Atlanta, GA 1 1 A local imam and Muslim spiritual leader guns down a deputy sheriff and injures his partner. 9/11/2001 USA Washington, DC 184 53 Nearly 200 people are killed when Islamic hijackers steer a plane full of people into the Pentagon. 9/11/2001 USA Shanksville, PA 40 0 Forty passengers are killed after Islamic radicals hijack the plane in an attempt to steer it into the U.S. Capitol building. 9/11/2001 USA New York, NY 2752 251 Islamic hijackers steer two planes packed with fuel and passengers into the World Trade Center, killing hundreds on impact and eventually killing thousands when the towers collapsed. At least 200 are seriously injured. 3/19/2002 USA Tuscon, AZ 1 0 A 60-year-old man is gunned down by Muslim snipers on a golf course. 5/27/2002 USA Denton, TX 1 0 Muslim snipers kill a man as he works in his yard. 7/4/2002 USA Los Angeles, CA 2 0 Muslim man pulls out a gun at the counter of an Israeli airline and kills two people. 9/5/2002 USA Clinton, MD 1 0 A 55-year-old pizzaria owner is shot six times in the back by Muslims at close range. 9/21/2002 USA Montgomery, AL 1 1 Muslim snipers shoot two women, killing one. 9/23/2002 USA Baton Rouge, LA 1 0 A Korean mother is shot in the back by Muslim snipers. 10/2/2002 USA Wheaton, MD 1 0 Muslim snipers gun down a program analyst in a store parking lot. 10/3/2002 USA Montgomery County, MD 5 0 Muslim snipers kill three men and two women in separate attacks over a 15-hour period. 10/9/2002 USA Manassas, VA 1 1 A man is killed by Muslim snipers while pumping gas two days after a 13-year-old is wounded by the same team. 10/11/2002 USA Fredericksburg, VA 1 0 Another man is killed by Muslim snipers while pumping gas. 10/14/2002 USA Arlington, VA 1 0 A woman is killed by Muslim snipers in a Home Depot parking lot. 10/22/2002 USA Aspen Hill, MD 1 0 A bus driver is killed by Muslim snipers. 8/6/2003 USA Houston, TX 1 0 After undergoing a religious revival, a Saudi college student slashes the throat of a Jewish student with a 4" butterfly knife, nearly decapitating the young man. 12/2/2003 USA Chicago, IL 1 0 A Muslim doctor deliberately allows a Jewish patient to die from an easily treatable condition. 4/13/2004 USA Raleigh, NC 1 4 A Muslim man runs down five strangers with a car. 4/15/2004 USA Scottsville, NY 1 2 In an honor killing, a Muslim father kills his wife and attacks his two daughters with a knife and hammer because he feared that they had been sexually molested. 6/16/2006 USA Baltimore, MD 1 0 A 62-year-old Jewish moviegoer is shot to death by a Muslim gunman in an unprovoked terror attack. 6/25/2006 USA Denver, CO 1 5 Saying that it was 'Allah's choice', a Muslim shoots four of his co-workers and a police officer. 7/28/2006 USA Seattle, WA 1 5 An 'angry' Muslim-American uses a young girl as hostage to enter a local Jewish center, where he shoots six women, one of whom dies. 10/6/2006 USA Louisville, KY 4 1 In an 'honor' attack, a Muslim man rapes and beats his estranged wife, leaving her for dead, then savagely murders their four children. 2/13/2007 USA Salt Lake City, UT 5 4 A Muslim immigrant goes on a shooting rampage at a mall, targeting people buying Valentine's Day cards at a gift shop and killing five. 1/1/2008 USA Irving, TX 2 0 A Muslim immigrant shoots his two daughters to death on concerns about their 'Western' lifestyle. 7/6/2008 USA Jonesboro, GA 1 0 A devout Muslim strangles his 25-year-old daughter in an honor killing. 2/12/2009 USA Buffalo, NY 1 0 The founder of a Muslim TV station beheads his wife in the hallway for seeking a divorce. 6/1/2009 USA Little Rock, AR 1 1 A Muslim with 'religious motives' shoots a local soldier to death inside a recruiting center. 11/2/2009 USA Glendale, AZ 1 1 A woman dies from injuries suffered when her father runs her down with a car for being too 'Westernized.' (10-20-09) 11/5/2009 USA Ft. Hood, TX 13 31 A Muslim psychiatrist guns down thirteen unarmed soldiers while yelling praises to Allah. 12/4/2009 USA Binghamton, NY 1 0 A non-Muslim Islamic studies professor is stabbed to death by a Muslim grad student in revenge for 'persecuted' Muslims. 4/14/2010 USA Marquette Park, IL 5 2 After quarrelling with his wife over Islamic dress, a Muslim convert shoots his family members to 'take them back to Allah' and out of the 'world of sinners'

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 12:58pm

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flyboy icarus asks us from Iran what are we supposed to do fight over a billion Muslims? This is a leading question in as much as he has decided that nothing can be done against Islamicists and the world has to put up with it. This is reminiscent of what people said about Germany under Hitler. "Are we supposed to go to war with the German people?" At the end of the day it was Germany that declared war on the US and I suspect that it will be Islamic countries that will determine whether we will go to war with them. There will not be a war against a “billion plus” Muslims because given the divisions within Islam not all of them will declare war on us; certainly not at the same time.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 1:07pm

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So Icarus the fly boy is in Iran with his Adonis. Are you at least working to release the American being held hostage there? Do you even care?

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 1:09pm

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Miceeelf asks to address what people like him supporters of Muslms are actually sayinig about the Muslim threat: Here is what they are saying: "Islam's linkage to terrorism is overstated, stereotypical" By Tim Moran http://www.dailycampus.com/commentary/islam-s-linkage-to-terrorism-is-overstated-stereotypical-1.1171277

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 1:15pm

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The above wasn't unique here is another comment of the same type. This one with antisemitic overtones: "Islam | The Problem of Islamic Terrorism Is Overstated" "Israel and the United States, deliberately using the weapons of mass media, psychological warfare, and political pressure, have . . . been leading a campaign against Islam (with Iran as its main agent) as the origin of terror and “fundamentalism.” Consider the background. Ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union there has been an active, explicit search in the United States for new official enemies, a search that has now come to settle on “Islam” as a manufactured opponent. In 1991 the Washington Post leaked news of a continuing study in the U.S. defense and..." http://www.enotes.com/islam-article/problem-islamic-terrorism-overstated

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 1:17pm

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"To take another analogy: I think it's wrong to assume that every young African American man is a criminal. This doesn't mean that I don't believe ANYONE is a criminal, " I'll say one thing: Miceelf reaches for the Black is criminal stereotype with the same sanctimonious ease that whatsis reached for the Jew-Wall Street stereotype. Not only that but he fails the test of a useful analogy: If you make an analogy the very least decent thing you can do is state the precedent with some accuracy. In what ways does black crime resemble global Muslim violence? Does the relationship between the black community in general and its criminal elements resemble in any way the relationship between Muslims and their violent Extremists? And most importantly, do you really want to compare criminals who are black with terrorists who are Muslims?

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 1:23pm

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K2K, I know you were. I was just teasing.

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 1:30pm

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Btw should there be an automatic closing of threads at the 200 posts mark?

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 1:31pm

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Poor dyer- he can't actually address what I say, so he instead has to refute what 'someone like him" says, and of course, the person is nothing like me. I asked Willjames to address what people here are saying, and dyer fires up his google machine to look up what people elsewhere are saying. Must be sharing drinks with Peretz.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 1:37pm

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"really nice people like WandreyCer see no danger at all in militant Islam and believe that Islamophobia is a much, much bigger problem." William: I'm not bothered with whether WC is a nice person or not. I have nothing upon which to make such an assessment. I'm pretty sure everyone here is a really nice person. Even antisemites can be nice. Look at Pat Buchanan. Isn't he the very personification of Irish charm and wit? How many of the Nazi sympathizers were really nice people? What does it mean, to be "nice people"? I know nice people who behave very badly when they are jousting for power, even in tiny insignificant fora. They behave like bullies and damage others because of their need to feel important, yet they are, truly, "nice people".

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 1:39pm

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My analogy only fails if one assumes that muslims are the most despicable and inhuman people in the world, and that every single one is in fact a terrorist sympathizer worthy of death. I'm more familiar with the stereotypes about Black people because they affect my life in a profound and daily way. I assumed it would fail with dyer. I did not assume it would fail with noga, but sadly, mistaken. Hopefully willjames will respond, eventually.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 1:41pm

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and, of course, any analogy about stereotypes regarding muslims will be misunderstood by people who believe that every negative stereotype about mulslims is true.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 1:45pm

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"Poor dyer- he can't actually address what I say" I find it pathetic that miceelf would actually think that, let alone say it out loud. I mean from someone who keeps tripping over his own "analogies" to imagine he is on par with someone of jackson's intellect and knowledge. Jackson has his flaws about which I wish he would be less indulgent but I doubt anyone can afford to belittle his levels of thinking and scholarship.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 1:45pm

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ironyroad "Btw should there be an automatic closing of threads at the 200 posts mark?" I would say cut it off at 100. I also wish TNR would make the blog comment area more user friendly For starters there should be a "first and previous" button at the top as well as at the bottom of the page.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 1:51pm

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miceelf "Poor dyer- he can't actually address what I say...." I have addresses what you said, I have also addressed what you didn't say but implied. The comments about the Muslim threat being overstated have been said by you on many occassions. What exactly do you mean when you say that Muslims are no more a danger to Americans than say Jews or Blacks? Aren't you saying that there is no threat?

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 1:55pm

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Another commentary about the Peretz-Fallows exchange: http://www.slate.com/id/2267273/

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 1:56pm

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"flyboy"? "Adonis"? I don't know if JD is homophobic or just jealous. Either way, it is endlessly amusing to see how the self-appointed anti-anti-Semite police manages, in mutliple posts in each thread, to demonstrate multiple bigotries and prejudices. This morning, I finally managed to catch up with the Weekend FT. There was a review of the latest life of Cardinal Newman - and there was mention how, by the time he was made Cardinal (at the age of 80, I think), he resembled a "toothless shrivelled shrimp." For some reason, I immediately thought of some posters here. I will simply say that it was not ironyroad. And I have absolutely no doubt that the usual suspects will find something anti-Semitic in the above paragraph. Waiting, with considerable interest, to see how the connections are made!

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 1:58pm

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Dyer, I didn't actually say that muslims were no more of a threat to Americans than are Jews and Blacks. So I have no idea what the voice in your head meant by it. Perhaps lay off the sauce a bit. Or buy a tv.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 1:59pm

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There should be direct access to the most recent comment right at the top of the page. It would also be nice if they added, next to each title on "The most commented" the current number of ripostes so that we know if a thread had progressed since our last visit. Charlie Rose message boards were very well organized and user friendly. I don't think I encountered a similarly well-organized BB ever since it got closed down. Maybe Marty can get in touch with the CR website director and ask her to have Rogerio help around here, for a consideration. He was an excellent web organizer as I recall. Kept the boards up to form.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 2:00pm

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icarus, one view of hatred is that it's really thwarted love, or love that cannot express itself. It's very possible that much of JD's problems not only with you, but with Arabs and Muslims more generally, may stem from his own failed encounter with his own "Adonis." As to anti-semitism in your post, well, shrimp are traife.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 2:01pm

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shrimp is also probably evidence of a bias in favor of Muslims, as it's one of the foods that Muslims can eat and practicing Jews cannot. Whether it's a compensation for alcohol, who knows?

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 2:06pm

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Mice: I found this in Fallows' article to sum up the discussion neatly:

"The upsurge in expressed hostility toward Muslims -- not toward extremists or terrorists but toward adherents of a religion as a group -- creates an American moment that isn't going to look good in historical retrospect."
This really is the point, isn't it.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 2:09pm

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Mice: "icarus, one view of hatred is that it's really thwarted love". And sometimes, as Freud said, a cigar is just a cigar.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 2:12pm

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"I immediately thought of some posters here. I will simply say that it was not ironyroad. " Gee I hope you didn't think so about ironyroad whose wit and intelligence would turn even a "toothless shrivelled shrimp" a George Clooney. (blush away, ironyroad.) On the other hand, even George Clooney with icarsur's milk-souring scowl and perpetually- disgusted grimace would be about as appealing as a "toothless shrivelled shrimp" I wonder why people who don't like other people for political reasons want to imagine them as ugly. I don't have that inclination at all. Some of the people I really dislike are good looking people (Rashid Khalidi, for example). icarus does reveal an ugly practice when he expresses himself in this way. The early Christian bishops had gone in a great deal of detail to describe the physical repulsiveness of Jews. They invented the "Jewish stink" by which Jews were to be sniffed even if by any chance you missed it from their ugliness. Der Sturmer notorious for their depiction of ugly Jews. Visit any Arab-Muslim blog and chances are you will find ugly representations of Jews, Israelis, Americans.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 2:20pm

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congratulations to slumlord-now-being-sued-by-Union-City-New-Jersey Imam Rauf and (newest problem) owes-too-much-back-rent-for-second-time-start-eviction-proceedings Sharif El-Gamal for creating a controversy that has directly led to "The upsurge in expressed hostility toward Muslims" which is an undocumented overstatment by Fallows, but who cares about the truth.... At least I now get to vote for Carl Paladino for New York governor because Paladino will chase these self-centered, attention-seeking deadbeats out of New York.

- K2K

September 15, 2010 at 2:20pm

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"..ve that cannot express itself. It's very possible that much of JD's problems not only with you, but with Arabs and Muslims more generally, may stem from his own failed encounter with his own "Adonis." Oh look miceelf again is trying to be too clever for his own good. Now he is implying, snicker snicker, nudge nude, that jackson is a closet homosexual. Yes icarus, take a closer look at your buddy miceelf and what that little wink/nudge actually implies. To use miceelf's favourite rhetorical mode, imagine if I were to say with obvious relish: So and So's problems with Jews may stem from his own unacknowledged fears that his mother was a Jew. See what I mean? See what I mean? Bloody unbelievable. Speaking of hypocrites and such like.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 2:31pm

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No time to enter into this most excellent fray but two quick points: 1. I certainly don't hate Peretz, admire some things about him, some of his views and his blog and am grateful for his "hosting" such a lively spot here; 2. ...I think basman's little analysis... Whaddya' mean "little"?

- basman

September 15, 2010 at 2:40pm

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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/sep/14/needed-a-second-opinion-on-shariah/? "Second opinion needed on Shariah" Our political establishment wears blinders and ignores the threat By R. James Woolsey, Andrew C. McCarthy and Harry E. Soyster for anyone wondering what Peretz actually meant before this apology. Sharia is totally incompatible with the U.S. Constitution.

- K2K

September 15, 2010 at 2:44pm

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"Whaddya' mean "little"?" Only that in length and effort it was just a little analysis unlike your sometimes other efforts which are more like treatises. Meaning no disrespect, Mr. Basman, Sir. I don't want to be banished from the thread. I hope you are not too displeased by my little gaff. I wasn't really thinking. You know what, forget I even mentioned it. Say you will! Pretty please?!

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 2:50pm

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"Sharia is totally incompatible with the U.S. Constitution." That may be so but according to Imam Rauf, the U.S. Constitution is compatible with Sharia.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 2:53pm

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"There was a review of the latest life of Cardinal Newman - and there was mention how, by the time he was made Cardinal (at the age of 80, I think), he resembled a 'toothless shrivelled shrimp'." It's the theology what does it. It'll get you in the end.

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 3:22pm

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...Say you will! Pretty please... Taken under advisement!

- basman

September 15, 2010 at 3:25pm

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Mice - I'm shocked - simply shocked that you could imply that a poster is a - gasp! - closet homosexual. Don't know you that in the Spin, you are only allowed to call every other poster an anti-Semite, Jew-hater, terrorist sympathiser, "an ayatollah", hyporcite, bigot, baby-killer, genocidaire ... but never, ever, such a gross insult as - shudder - "closet homosexual"? Shame on you.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 5:11pm

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miceelf “Dyer, I didn't actually say that muslims were no more of a threat to Americans than are Jews and Blacks. So I have no idea what the voice in your head meant by it.” So you do think they are a threat? Let’s hear more.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 5:24pm

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Icarus (harem boy) Sorry but I am not gay and am not jealous of you. Even if I were gay (or even if you were a female) I would never be attracted to a warped hypocritical narcissist like you.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 5:26pm

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Icarursr, you're also allowed to engage in all kinds of hateful homophobic language, but yes, raising the possibility that one is a homosexual, welll, that's The Worst Possible Thing. And here I thought dyer was the only homophobe here. My mother could very well be Jewish; I've had the Lubavitchers, on more than one occasion, insist that I must be Jewish and thus must "come back to the conservative pradtice of Judaism." I certainly am far closer to keeping kosher and shabbat than most of my secular Jewish friends.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 5:27pm

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dyer, why don't you actually find a quote by me that says what you claim I said? Then, perhaps, I'll be willing to be schooled by your vast "intellect and knowledge"

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 5:30pm

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icarusr “Mice - I'm shocked - simply shocked that you could imply that a poster is a - gasp! - closet homosexual.” Closet homosexual, what a dumb cliché. It’s not Icarus’ homosexuality that’s the problem it’s his masochistic personality. For a homosexual Jew to make excuses for an Islamic State is like Jew telling us that he actually appreciated Nazi Germany.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 5:32pm

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miceelf "dyer, why don't you actually find a quote by me that says what you claim I said?" It's all over everything you say. I trust posters to decide for themselves. Those who can't see it, tant pire.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 5:35pm

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I will say this for icarus. He's done some mighty funny posts over the last couple of years (ok ok I don't go for the scatalogical myself either, but still, that was a minority) and he knows about Iran in a way that 98% of us don't and he carries his Canadianicity lightly and he's open about his sexual orientation (or one of them) and he generally seems not to bear grudges. I don't particularly understand the animus against him on your part (Noga) or yours (JD) -- I mean, I do understand getting into skirmishes with individuals and using some sharp weapons (btw in my case I find K2K a very frustrating figure as he can do some funny and unpredictably left-field kinds of things and then he comes out with something that could be from Hannity and it makes no sense -- K2K!!!! Why do you torture me so???) but long-term hostility between ick and others seems somehow wrong here.

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 5:38pm

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Ah well. My loss, I'm sure, jdyer.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 5:51pm

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“I don't particularly understand the animus against him …. (JD) -- I mean, I do understand getting into skirmishes….” I’ll let Noga answer for herself. Icarus is repellent hypocrite always ready to understand antisemitism but can’t tolerate any negative comments against Muslims. He may not be a “closet homosexual” but he has certainly put his Jewishness (if he has any left) in the closet. There is a kind of antisemitism (and while I don’t think that Jewish self hatred is real---Jewish antisemites merely hate other Jews and not themselves) which is more common among homosexuals which is aesthetic in nature. They tend to hate the Jewish religion as “unaesthetic” prefer Greek mythology or any other kind world view to what is considered the “Semitic one.” Oscar Wild was one of that ilk, although he seems to have a distinction between the Jewish religion (“not charming”) and Jewish people some of whom he found “charming.” Late 19th early 20 century was full of such people and Proust has written quite eloquently about them. One doesn't have to be gay to hold aestetic antisemitic views, but many gay people did and do. Icarus’ views as expressed on this blog fit the pattern of the aesthetic antisemite and snub.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 5:56pm

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Everything important is lost on you miceelf.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 5:57pm

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JD: "For a homosexual Jew to make excuses for an Islamic State is like Jew telling us that he actually appreciated Nazi Germany." Actually, I totally agree. And to the extent sexual orientation matters at all in political philosophy, I would go one step further - it is immoral, in my view, for a gay man or a Lesbian, of whatever political stripe, to be anti-Israel (the state). So if you ever read anything of mine that "made excuses for an Islamic State", whatever that state might, to the extent that Islamic State was acting inconsistently with law and morality, feel free to call me on it. Of course, I have never done so - "made excuses", that is. How can I? I fled from one and lost family members to it. To point out the complexity of a religion and a community that spreads from the Atlantic to the Pacific and encompasses 1.2 billion people of vastly diverse races and cultures, and to note that constant vilification of the entire community because of the ills of a minority is probably not the best way to deal with a real problem, which is Islamist violence and radicalism, rather than Islam itself, or Muslims, or Arabs, is not to "make excuses" for an or any Islamic State. I just refuse to hate and refuse to permit myself blinded, on the question of Islam and Muslims, by my own quite negative experiences. I am willing to accept that there are Muslims who do not bray for my blood, and also accept that there is an aspect of Islam, the faith, that may well be compatible with our Western values, here, and not at war with it, there. I have to - I cannot believe that our only option dealing with Islamist terrorism is all out war. Moreover, when I read the asinine and bigoted posts of Peretz and others, they make me fear. I've heard all of that before. That constitutional protection is a privilege that some deserve and others don't. That unless there is allegiance, however defined, the protections should not be extended. That this or that community is parasitic. I have heard it all before and lived it. And fled it. I promised - I will not become what I beheld. I will defend my values, but not at the cost of losing them. If this is narcissism or masochism, so be it, but there you have it.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 6:15pm

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"There is a kind of antisemitism (and while I don’t think that Jewish self hatred is real---Jewish antisemites merely hate other Jews and not themselves) which is more common among homosexuals which is aesthetic in nature." Speaking of asinine comments - if ever there was one, this it. "Icarus’ views as expressed on this blog fit the pattern of the aesthetic antisemite and snub." Except that this is even more idiotic than the other.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 6:18pm

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Irony: sweet of you - but I confess I do not feel terribly privileged by the animus, which appears to be broadly directed against anyone who departs ever so slightly from some holy script in the minds of certain posters. I mean, honestly, anyone who comes up with an insult such as "harem boy" out of nowhere deserves pity, really, for the evident mental imbalance. In this sense, it is really easy not to bear a grudge :).

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 6:23pm

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ic, you're asking for evidence and that's not dyer's strong suit. He *knows* in some fundamental and gut-based way. there's no need confuse the issue with facts. It's like one long Colbert Report skit. "I don't need facts, i know with my gut!" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBRKPoAPXEQ and "Muslims- subhuman or ultimate subhumans?"

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 6:50pm

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What irony said about ick (though I resent the veiled implication that I don't carry my Canadianicity lightly. Canada fills me with an unbearable lightness of being. I float around the place and will float more lightly when I lose the 15 pounds that crept up on me when I wasn't looking. Plus I know a guy who knows Jim Flaherty.)

- basman

September 15, 2010 at 7:00pm

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09/15/2010 - 5:38pm EDT | ironyroad "btw in my case I find K2K a very frustrating figure as he can do some funny and unpredictably left-field kinds of things and then he comes out with something that could be from Hannity and it makes no sense -- K2K!!!! Why do you torture me so???)" irony: if watching a formerly devoted Democrat, whose economics lean to Robert Kuttner, who has never watched Hannity or listened to Limbaugh, if my evolution in these threads is torture to you, well, then, imagine what it is like for me. I refuse to accept blind loyalty to any ideology or political party. I find it increasingly tortorous to even read TNR comment threads when the ideological, incurious robots take over, puppets who only revert to screaming bigot!!! racist!!!! to anyone who questions or declines to join the madness of their crowd. Since TNR wants $80 to renew, I shall use my remaining weeks to de-toxify from too much exposure to true-believing Liberals. Now that The New Yorker and The Atlantic are being infected by their editorial ideologues, I am not sure what to do. It has taken me two years to end lifelong habits, like starting my day with the NYT. I worked for the Dems. I joined the Obama campaign for a few months. I would rather read the right than the useful idots of the left who see no evil, hear no evil, and are enabling the decay of what used to be America. The betrayal is killing me. Just not fast enough for it to be over.

- K2K

September 15, 2010 at 7:54pm

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icarusr “Speaking of asinine comments - if ever there was one, this it.” Since you are an ass, you would certainly see these comments as “assinine.” In any case, I wasn’t addressing an ignorant ass like you (and you have given plenty of evidence of your ignorance of Western cultural, especially literary history) it doesn’t matter to me what you think or say. I was answering a question by Irony. Whether he agrees with me or not is his business, but at least he knows what I am talking about.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 8:05pm

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Icarsur: "Mice - I'm shocked - simply shocked that you could imply that a poster is a - gasp! - closet homosexual. " No. miceelf, convinced that jackson is prejudiced about homoexuals, wanted to insult him by suggesting he was himself gay. The implication being that homosexuality can be deployed as as insult in the same way that antisemitic bigots can be baited by suggesting they were themselves Jews. The fact that icarus forgives him for this slight should be taken in the context of icarus's refusal to accept Marty's apology for saying something about Muslims. Apparently, icarus's ethical balance is not perturbed by the slurring of gays but is greatly agitated by criticism of Muslims. The hypocrisy of the double standard. As for ironyroad's question: what can I say? Icarsur has been calling me a liar and a bigot and what not ever since I first engaged with him but for some reason you did not see anything wrong with that so as to give him a dressing down. But you do address your ire to me. So your ethical bone is selective, so what else is new, eh? Nice work, ironyroad. By the way, for someone of icarus's sensibilities the only language he openly denigrated was Hebrew (What an ugly sounding language, he wrote, in response to some youtube I posted in one of our very first conversations). That for me suggests a baiting personality, an ugly type of bigotry. I do not forget.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 8:59pm

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“By the way, for someone of icarus's sensibilities the only language he openly denigrated was Hebrew (What an ugly sounding language, he wrote, in response to some youtube I posted in one of our very first conversations). That for me suggests a baiting personality, an ugly type of bigotry.” He has also made ugly remarks about the Jewish religion while extolling the virtues of the Islamic religion. I could go on, but it doesn’t matter he will never acknowledge his contempt for Jews and all things Jewish. Does Icarus ever tell his Muslim friends and lovers that he is Jewish?

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 9:12pm

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"But you do address your ire to me." No ire. I don't recall every single exchange but I can recall one where I felt that you had responded in what seemed to me to be a very harsh way to icarus that his original remark had not earned or provoked. It was also a period in which I felt that I was being singled out by you for misquoting, selective quoting, and just a general refusal to read my comments with any openness whatsoever, so probably my solidarity level was low. By the way, what's all this about ick being Jewish? Did I miss an episode? I thought he was some gay Iranian dude who had escaped the Mullahs and was a lapsed Muslim. Ick?

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 9:20pm

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i thought ick was ba'hai. Shows what I know. basman, the Canadian in me appreciates the Canadian in you.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 9:46pm

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I'm sorry you feel that way, K2K. For me, the election of Obama was a signal of the basic generosity and intelligence of American society, our willingness to embrace change and do something that even more racially diverse societies than ours have failed to do, and I believe that this adminstration has been attacked and pilloried much worse than the Clinton administration and that was bad enough. For my part, I see the decay of what was America in the mindless rightward gallop of the Republicans, who have not a single, not a single lonely idea about how to deal with the major challenges this country will face at home and abroad the next couple of decades.

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 9:53pm

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Irony: My grandfather was Jewish, and I have cousins in Tel Aviv; I never claimed I was, though I spend a lot of time with my Jewish friends in Toronto and usually attend High Holiday events with them. When I was living in Europe, an Israeli friend of mine (in fact, an Israeli diplomat) told me that under Israeli law, because of my grandfather, I would be eligible for Israeli citizenship, and I did at some point wonder about moving to Tel Aviv. But life and the second Intifada intervened, and I never found out if my Israeli friend was right. Maybe one day .... I am not and have never been Muslim, though I was forced to study the Koran and Arabic, which I never learned to speak. This brings me to noga's "the only language he openly denigrated was Hebrew": talk about quoting or misquoting or lying ... and this is an outright lie. I neither denigrated Hebrew nor was it the "only" language about which I commented. In successive posts, I said that Hebrew, Arabic, Danish and Dutch all sounded ugly to me, because they all sounded harsh. Hebrew and Dutch because of the "kh" sound, and Arabic and Danish because of the glottal stops .... In any event, as I explained at the time - under a barrage of "bigot" insults from the dynamic duo - my reaction to the sounds of Hebrew (and Arabic, and Dutch, and Danish) is of course not a "denigration" of a language, but a matter of the impact of the melodies of each on my ear. I love English theatre but find English opera silly and grating; I love Jazz but don't like rap music; there are certain dialects of Persian that hurt my ear. It is part of the same aural experience. JD and Noga consider it bigotry; would that all bigotry was limited to the dislike of the sounds and melodies of language. Then there is JD's idiotic, "He has also made ugly remarks about the Jewish religion while extolling the virtues of the Islamic religion." As stated, this too is an outright lie. In the literally tens of thousands of words I have written since 2006, the only context in which I could have, or would have, said, or did say, anything "negative" about "the Jewish religion" would have been to quote selectively from Leviticus, to point out that it is possible to quote selectively from a religious text to make the religion sound awful. And in fact this is how Martin Sheen put the Ann Coulter character in her place in The West Wing, so nothing extraordinary there. (I also, in the same passage, quoted Paul.) I have, on occasion, referred to Kings and to Judges, mostly reciting the many "smites" in them. But that is all. Nor have I ever, in any context, "extolled the virtues" of Islam, as such. I am at best apathetic, but mostly antipathetic, to the concept of organized religion, so by definition I cannot, and will not, extoll any religion. What I have done is to point out that for every really nasty passage of the Koran, and for every violent hadith, there is at least one and sometimes more passages of the Koran and hadith that tend in the other direction. I have also noted that for many believing Muslims, Islam carries a different message than that of the Taliban. This is an unremarkable and uncontroversial observation, but one that nevertheless raises the ire of some posters here. Finally, the one passage of the Koran that I have "extolled" is a sura of sublime poetry that outlaws the practice of burying infant daughters prevalent among Arabs of the time: in composition and moral message, that sura is magnificent and to denigrate it because it is in the Koran or because it is Islamic would be, well, at best ignorant. And this is why, to keep my own sanity and to maintain the dignity of TNR threads, I do not, by and large, respond to these two oiks.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 10:20pm

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Mice: Lapsed, since my first beer ;) ...

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 10:23pm

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"and I did at some point wonder about moving to Tel Aviv.... Maybe one day ...." Really? And subject yourself willingly to the ugly sounds of Hebrew being spoken within earshot all the time? What other moving tales of high faluting sensibilities have you got to tell us by way of excusing yourself from being held accountable for your pronouncements? Do you think producing a Jewish grandfather is enough to exculpate you from your totally gratuitous insult to Hebrew speaking people? Your comment, btw, was exactly as I told it. Those additional details were wheeled when I reminded you of that earlier gaff. I wonder how you would have reacted if Marty were to announce casually and without provocation , "What an ugly language Arabic is".

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 10:44pm

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I find Arabic odd to my ears, as if everyone was clearing their throat in advance of picking a fight with someone else. That, however, is subjective and, in a way, ignorant. But it's true. I am pretty sure that if I lived for a month in an Arabic-speaking environment, or even learned a bit, that would change. I lived in Germany for over ten years, but some aspects of German (a language I love) still strike the wrong chord with me.

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 10:53pm

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"No ire. I don't recall every single exchange but I can recall one where I felt that you had responded in what seemed to me to be a very harsh way to icarus that his original remark had not earned or provoked. It was also a period in which I felt that I was being singled out by you for misquoting, selective quoting, and just a general refusal to read my comments with any openness whatsoever, so probably my solidarity level was low." I don't need your solidarity, ironyroad. My question was purely rhetorical. I knew what you would say. No surprises there. You are incapable of any serious self-criticism. Just don't pretend that you are a balanced and disinterested bystander in these quarrels.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 10:57pm

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icarusr “My grandfather was Jewish, and I have cousins in Tel Aviv; I never claimed I was, though I spend a lot of time with my Jewish friends in Toronto and usually attend High Holiday events with them.” “This is a variation on some of my best friends are Jewish.” Icarus is a very predictable fellow. He is also a liar. He did claim that he was Jewish when he was challenged about some ugly thing he said about Israel. He used to say that he was a law professor then when he was challenged he said he taught part time and actually worked for the UN. Now we are told that he only a part time Jew. Hard to know what to believe about him. Here is what he said about Hebrew: 06/20/2010 - 8:48pm EDT | icarusr “In any event, as I don't read Hebrew, I could not possibly have commented on anything written here. If I made a general comment about how Hebrew sounds, it is no different from anything I would say about Danish, Dutch, Arabic or Urdu, all of which grate on my ears for one reason or the other….” http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-spine/75704/obama-the-astonishing-progress-dubai-once-unbelievably-wealthy-now-just-crooked Yet Icarus’ focus was on Hebrew and not on “Danish, Dutch, Arabic or Urdu.” These other languages are introduced in order to justify his denigration of the Hebrew language. Don’t expect honesty from Icarus and you won’t be disappointed.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 11:01pm

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I agree entirely, about both Arabic and German. Certain Austrian dialects and Swiss German grate the ear, just as the dialect of Baden-Wuertemburg is immensely pleasing. The Economist once called Dutch an ugly language, a sentiment with which I eminently agree. It is neither a gratuitous insult to the Dutch people nor a statement of fact. For the record, I love Colombian and Argentinean Spanish, but cannot stand Spanish or Cuban Spanish (does not stop me from going to Spain over and over again - a country, and its people, are more than the sound of their language). Edinburgh English is lovely, in the same measure as Newcastle English is grating. And so on. This sort of observation is an entirely personal matter, and whoever takes umbrage at the personal tastes of others in respect of languages or music or art, and thinks the expression of such personal tastes as "gratuitous insult" to an entire people needs to take a Valium, or a bottle or two of it for that matter.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 11:04pm

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"That, however, is subjective and, in a way, ignorant. " Don't worry. You'll be forgiven for this smear upon Arabic speaking people. Just as miceelf's homophobic innuendos was excused by icarus. No doubt it is a sin to notice the violence of Arab-Muslim societies but not to cast aspersions upon their language. FWIW, recited poetry in Arabic is a beautiful melodious experience completely bereft of any bellicosity. http://nizos.blogspot.com/2010/06/idf-super-star-druze-vs-bedouin.html

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 11:11pm

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"The Economist once called Dutch an ugly language, a sentiment with which I eminently agree. It is neither a gratuitous insult to the Dutch people nor a statement of fact." The Economist hasn't said nice things about Hebrew or Israel either. But this is beside the point. Icarus rejected the Hebrew language and instead of owning up to it he keeps justifying his rejection. (Yet this same poster didn't want to accept Marty's apology about something he said; hypocrisy and more hypocrisy.) For the record I find nothing ugly in the Dutch language. Every language that I don't know is to me a puzzle that I am anxious to decode. Applying aesthetic standards to language is like applying olfactory standards to architecture.

- jdyer

September 15, 2010 at 11:25pm

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Oy ... you don't stop lying JD, ever, do you. Read below and then go forth and multiply. "Channy - I'm not American; rather, Persian with a wild array of other influences (including a Jewish grandfather, Georgian and Iraqi cousins, Turkic great grandparents, descent to the Prophet Mohammed in one branch and to the last Byzantine Emperor in another)." http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-spine/good-news-iran-welcome-president-obama "I'm of very mixed background, one side tracing back to the Prophet Mohammed, a Jewish grandfather, grandmothers descendants of the Mongol hordes who ravaged the Middle East in the Middle Ages, there is a Byzantine queen in there somewhere ... etc. ... but I wear none of the background on my sleeve." http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-stump/damn-kids "Iran has 35,000 Jews still living there - my cousins among them - and while there are occasional problems, there has never been a concerted campaign of discrimination against the Jews in Iran. Had I stayed in Iran, I could have lived as a Jew and have a reasonable life (in some respects, more free than the average Muslim), or a Baha'ii - with no rights, no liberties and no prospects. " http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-spine/good-news-iran-welcome-president-obama "Growing up as a Baha'i in Iran (with a Jewish grandfather), especially in the course of the revolution, the question of "interest" and allegiance, and political world view was ever-present: did I root for Israel because of my Jewish grandfather, because of my Baha'i mother, because as a Persian I should hate Arabs, because Arafat was an odious frog, or because Israel was the only country in the region whose interests happen to coincide with those of Iran? And what if those interests diverge? To be sure, to this day, as soon as I say a word about Israel, my Muslim friends nod knowingly and think, or say outright, "but YOU would say that"." http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-plank/the-latest-delusions-lawrence-wilkerson

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 11:33pm

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"one side tracing back to the Prophet Mohammed," Hmm. Like Saddam Hussein. I always knew icarus was very special. Never mind. This explains a great deal.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 11:39pm

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"Applying aesthetic standards to language is like applying olfactory standards to architecture." If you are building a sewer, or a perfume shop, maybe you should. What is absurd, as I mentioned in the post that you helpfully copied, is to try to determine someone's "bigotry" on the basis of how they react to the sounds and melodies of particular languages.

- icarusr

September 15, 2010 at 11:39pm

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I don't enjoy british cooking. I must be an anglophobe. Describing one's subjective experience of a thing isn't at all the same thing as bigotry, even if that subjective experience isn't good. There are a host of reasons not to like a particular set of sounds that have nothing to do with bigotry. But of course this is upside down land, where dyer is learned and not at all homophobic, although he can't address ick without making a homophobic slur. My suggestion of the possibility that dyer himself might be gay, however, is prima facae evidence of blatant homophobia, which presumes that being gay is inherently bad, something I don't believe, and noga and dyer appear to believe. The problem with ick, of course, and with most of the other people here who aren't dyer and his cadre, is not that we hate Jews- I don't and I don't think anyone else here does either, with the obvious exception of the hopefully no longer present ndmack. Dyer and his crew would actually find common ground with most antisemites, as long as they also hate muslims. Because the problem for them is not that one hates Jews too much; it's that one hates Muslims too little. No such thing as too much hate, in their eyes. The sin is not having enough.

- miceelf

September 15, 2010 at 11:48pm

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"...is to try to determine someone's "bigotry" on the basis of how they react to the sounds and melodies of particular languages." No. Not how they react. I would have no way of knowing how you reacted upon hearing a Hebrew speaking youtube. You wanted to tell us how you felt about it: what an ugly language Hebrew is. And it was not out of an irresistible need to be honest. Not in the context of our conversation when you had already provided false information. I wondered what made you write it in this forum. I would guess that you are not used to such expressed sentiments being challenged.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 11:52pm

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This thread is like a treasure trove. A good thing I saved it on my files.

- noga1

September 15, 2010 at 11:57pm

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"I don't need your solidarity, ironyroad" You're equally as predictable, Noga. We seem to share a fault.

- ironyroad

September 15, 2010 at 11:58pm

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Yup, I'm just like Saddam Hussein (and about fifteen million others) in that respect. And have you noticed that Barack Hussein Obama not only shares the same name as Saddam, but also is a negro, like Willie Horton and Thabo Mbeki? This would explain a great deal, according to you. His being Muslim, Kenyan and, let's be frank, a negro. Just as my 1/1028th part Arab lineage explains a great deal.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 12:00am

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"You'll be forgiven for this smear upon Arabic speaking people." It's not a smear. A smear would be an intentional slur meant to negatively impact a particular target, such as "Noga deliberately goes out of her way to misunderstand irony's comments." It's a purely subjective reaction such as every human being has about something (not necessarily language). But, yes, it does mean having to suppress an initial hostility sometimes when I hear Arabic.

- ironyroad

September 16, 2010 at 12:05am

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mice is like a homeless drunk intruding on other peoples conversations.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 12:06am

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" Just as my 1/1028th part Arab lineage explains a great deal." You said, icaris and I quote: ""one side tracing back to the Prophet Mohammed," You did not say "Arab lineage". So I was impressed. And when I said: "that explains a lot" I meant that the fact that you think you are directly descended from Mohamed explains a lot about your mental condition. You really are not at all as clever as you think you are. You keep missing things and get yourself entangled in a lot of verbiage. Like the rest of your pathetic comment. I'll dare you to find one example, one quote from my record here or elsewhere, that supports your slanderous attributions. Getting desperate, aren't you?

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 12:09am

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"one side tracing back to the Prophet Mohammed," That M. was some prolific dude. There tens of millions of Muslims who claim him for an ancestor. I was only commenting, btw, on threads I was interested in and in which Icarus also posted. I have nothing to say about the fibs he typed elsewhere. (Just because he told the same fib over and over again doesn't make it any truer, btw.)

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 12:09am

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icarusr "And have you noticed that Barack Hussein Obama not only shares the same name as Saddam, but also is a negro, like Willie Horton and Thabo Mbeki?" Is this what you believe? Obama isn't the issue, here. You are.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 12:11am

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"It's not a smear. A smear would be an intentional slur meant to negatively impact a particular target," Really? I just said so to icarus. (09/15/2010 - 11:52pm EDT) So glad you agree with me.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 12:12am

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If you could dial down the sarcasm for a moment -- no problem. I agree when I agree, and sometimes it's a straight up-or-down thing, and sometimes it's a negotiated thing. But a reasonable percentage, all in all.

- ironyroad

September 16, 2010 at 1:00am

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I don't solicit your agreement ironyroad. If I did, I would not have resorted to sarcasm, which is a device I try to avoid in any discourse. BTW, we had this conversation once or twice before which is why you can speak of predictability. All you need to predict someone's reaction is to pay some attention. I take it you don't like it when you are deemed predictable. How very ironish.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 7:14am

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Wow! This is quite a.... discussion?... What is the record for number of posts in our little tnr universe?

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 8:36am

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jacko: in any thread in which JD and Noga are the principal posters, and where they have found something to divert attention from the main point of the post to abuse someone, the sky is the limit. Note that the real issue is Marty's disingenuous "apology", which he has been called on by everyone "out there"; instead, JD and Noga concentrate on a comment I made about the sound of Hebrew. JD: you accused me of being inconsistent or having said something that I had not, and I pointed out that you lied and lied ... and provided "evidence" as well. So having been proven a liar, you go on and make the most idiotic comment of all: that anything I have said about my past in successive post is a "fib". Whatever. Go back to your kiddie porn. Noga: your post, "This explains a lot", is ambiguous enough to mean anything, and liek K2K earlier, you give yourself enough room to wiggle out of an overtly bigoted comment. But I know you have no good faith and are an anti-Arab and anti-Islam bigot, and so the only conclusion was that somehow my (minor) Arab lineage or the tracing of it to Mohammed "explained" my current liberalism, which you and JD take for pro-Islamist terror sentiment. Any way, as I noted, there are tons of people who claim descent to the prophet - I have no way of "proving" that, nor to "prove" the story about the Byzantine princess (funny you did not think that explained anything). I have to take these family histories with a mix of a grain of salt and modicum of seriousness, but draw no conclusions from them, either way. Ethnically, I am Persian with a large Turkic influence; the rest is gravy, and simply reminds me that in that region, we are so mixed as to make any sort of ethnocentric comment idiotic.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 8:59am

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Noga. To suffer a valid indictment of hypocrisy it is necessary to define the parameters and degrees of knowing or consciousness. The extents of extant, if you will. In that I define parameters of consciousness beyond Ego (that which we think we are at the moment) and Self (that which we think we are plus that which we really are..... known and Unrealized) I lean toward a robust inclusiveness in this capacity and its manifest reality.

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 9:07am

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Ick. I should make it clear that although, I abhor labels as we all rewrite according to our own proclivities, I would happily/unhappily fight for Israel on behalf of standing against a diseased hatred promulgated by the prevailing winds of the current Islamic zeitgeist.

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 9:17am

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"nor to "prove" the story about the Byzantine princess (funny you did not think that explained anything). " As I said, icarus, you do take yourself much too seriously. I don't read everything you say. It is too verbose, meandering and sentimental for me to bother putting in the effort, and with very little returns, if any. So I don't know what you mean by the princess. Are you also descendant from royalty? Is that it? I'm duly impressed. Any Cyrus blood there, in your distinguished lineage? What are you? An overgrown teenager?

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 9:22am

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Jacko: I'm intrigued by your comment about inclusiveness. Do you mean that the concept of hypocrisy should be broadened to include not just an external interaction between the one and another but also the dynamics inside the self? Can a person be hypocritical to oneself? Don't we call that self-delusion and isn't it a dangerous state to be in as it may distort reality and therefore our competence to deal with it?

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 9:33am

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Jacko, this probably begins with the parameters of Self as well. Am I the same person I was five years ago? A year? A day? A minute? Are other current selves more likely, given the actions of past self? Does the aspirational future self count, and if so, under what conditions? Certainly, there is some continuity, but how much is required for an inconsistency between the current self-pronouncements and the past self's actions to count as hypocrisy?

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 9:38am

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"Can a person be hypocritical to oneself?" Aye. That's the battle we fight. The war is called Ignorance. One of the weapons fielded by the combatants is an overvaluation of Intellect as an exclusive vessel and arbiter of Wisdom.

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 9:48am

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Mice. Good thoughts. Back on that later. Noga. You know I love ya. I want to come back to this as time permits but now I have some needful things requiring attention.

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 9:52am

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This has been one of the more dismal threads in quite some time. The personal attacks and the relentless counter-thrusts that run on for pages make meaningful conversation virtually impossible. Personally, I've lost my taste for sand-box play where everybody starts throwing sand and has a different account of who started playing nasty. If I've offended anyone, I apologize. There is no hatred in my heart; there is deep anxiety about the dangers of Islamism, and frustration and disappointment at the refusal of certain individuals to adequately grasp those dangers. (Now, someone will probably accuse me of merely parroting Marty's vile bilge...)

- willjames77

September 16, 2010 at 10:05am

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Being loved is nice. Being understood, however, is crucial. It rounds back to my initial post about the insufficiency of love as an arbiter of what is right and decent. :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnYPYInXtOQ&feature=related

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 10:08am

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More icarusr lies: “Note that the real issue is Marty's disingenuous "apology", which he has been called on by everyone "out there"; instead, JD and Noga concentrate on a comment I made about the sound of Hebrew.” Another whopping lie. Both Noga and myself addressed the Marty’s so called “disingenuous apology.” I found the charges ridiculous, almost as ridiculous as you are. The rest of your verbose post is more Icarur temper tantrums. “Go back to your kiddie porn.” I don’t do porn. That is your specialty, icarusr. This is why you are back in Iran, isn’t it? Sad, that this should be your best comeback line. You are boring, boring, boring, as well as a liar.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 10:09am

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I just read the following report of a speech of a lecturer in one of Iran's leading religious schools in Qum; it does not appear to be a joke, either. In the light of the report, I owe an apology to everyone. And, unlike Marty, I will not pussy-foot around it. I have written what I meant. Evidently it was based on rank ignorance of basic facts. I apologise. Here are the facts: وي همچنين با اشاره به سخنان امام جمعه نيويورك مبني بر اينكه هر هفته تعدادي از غير مسلمانان، به دين مبين اسلام روي مي آورند گفت: در كشورهاي اروپايي و آمريكا، مغزهاي بزرگ و فرهيختگان لحظه به لحظه به اسلام روي مي آورند. وي با بيان اينكه اسلام به كاخ سفيد نيز سرايت كرده است گفت: گرايش دختر بيل كلينتون و مادرش به اسلام و وجود نام حسين در شناسنامه اوباما يكي از نشانه هاي اين مهم است. وي با اشاره به اينكه نام رييس جمهوري آمريكا 'باراك حسين اوباما' است گفت: قبل از انتخابات رياست جمهوري آمريكا نام حسين از اسم رييس جمهوري آمريكا حذف شد. وي اصالت اوباما را ايراني دانست و گفت: برك به معني پشم شتر است و در تلفظ انگليسي باراك خوانده مي شود. حجت الاسلام عرفان ادامه داد: اجداد اوباما در بوشهر ايران به توليد و فروش پشم شتر مشغول بوده اند.

"Referring to the latest speech of the Friday Imam of New York concerning the conversion, each week, of a number of non-Muslims to Islam, [Professor Erfan] confirmed that, 'in the US and in European countries, the great minds and intellectuals are constantly turning to Islam.' He noted that Islam has even spread to the White House, stating that, 'the inclination of the daughter of Bill Clinton and also her mother to Islam, and the name Hussein on Obama's birth certificate is an important proof of [the domination of the White House by Islam]. He stressed that the name of the President of the United States is Barack Hussein Obama, and stated that before the presidential elections, the name Hussein had been removed from the name of the President. He went on to assert that Obama is, in fact, of Iranian origin. What is pronounced as 'Barack' in English, is actually from 'bar'ak' in Persian, which means camel wool. It's obvious, he underlined, that Obama's ancestors were dealers and traders in camel wool in Bushehr. ..."
http://www.asriran.com/fa/news/136395/مدرس-حوزه-فارسي-وان-بدتر-از-قرآن-سوزي-است-دختر-بيل-كلينتون-و-مادرش-به-اسلام-گرایش-دارند-اوباما-ایرانی-است Incidentally, Bushehr is also where Iran's nuclear reactor is based. Coincidence? I think not. Again, my apologies to all those whom I have accused of racism or worse when they say that Hussein Obama is a secret Muslim. He is, also, it would seem, Iranian and his ancestors are responsible for Iran's nuclear program. Remember - when this all comes out, you read it here first.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 10:39am

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JD: "This is why you are back in Iran, isn’t it?" Just a few posts above, in this thread, I stated that I had not been in Iran for nearly thirty years. I am not allowed to go back. Any way, that is such a stupid non-sequitur: one does not go to Iran to do porn when, as you well know from personal experience, every incontinent senile bugger can have access to it with $20 a month (for the internet access) and a click of the mouse. Finally, it is an inconsistent non-sequitur: "harem-boys", whatever that might mean, don't really need porn, do they? It's like whack-a-mole, trying to correct your constant, irritating and really dumb misrepresentations.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 10:45am

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"I don't solicit your agreement ironyroad." I didn't say you did, Noga, I merely said that it occurred a reasonable perecentage of the time. But as you apparently desire neither agreement nor a more general solidarity/support, and indeed now appear to reject same, I am then confused as to why you indict me for not having provided it when you were attacked by icarus. It's as if, when I explain why, you don't like my answer, and then proceed to declare a complete lack of interest in exactly the thing you accused me one post back of not having supplied. It's a little . . . vertigo-inducing. In any case, I believe that it would be practically schizophrenic to engage in debate and not solicit agreement. The whole point of discussion among a group is to explore areas of agreement and areas of disagreement, unless it's just some kind of theater (I don't deny a performative dimension, of course, but it's not the raison d'etre).

- ironyroad

September 16, 2010 at 10:47am

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Noga: Being loved is nice. Being understood, however, is crucial. It rounds back to my initial post about the insufficiency of love as an arbiter of what is right and decent. :) And that tail eating serpent has its way. :) And so each proposition confirming the other. Managing Middle-Earth is quite a project. Neh? That the way out of the Ring is a straight line through the Center.

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 10:56am

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willjames, I don't think that the problem is merely that I (to take a silly example) am blind to the dangers of extremist Islamic fundamentalism. I take it quite seriously, as I think many discussions on TNR have shown. However, firstly, the fact is that you and I might disagree -- without either intending malice -- on the degree of overlap between extremist Islamism and the religion practised daily by a very large number people on the planet, including American citizens. And secondly, even if we disagree on that, surely we would agree that it is a strategic misstep to imagine even more enemies and call hostile forces into being with whom we have no reason to be at war, and indeed much interest in not being at war with them.

- ironyroad

September 16, 2010 at 11:01am

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More masturbatory posts by Icarusr.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 11:24am

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"But as you apparently desire neither agreement nor a more general solidarity/support, and indeed now appear to reject same, I am then confused as to why you indict me for not having provided it when you were attacked by icarus." Yes, you are right that my statements were not completely coherent. It comes from my misunderstanding the configuration of your vaunted position. I wanted to illustrate the inconsistencies in your own averred positions here. When someone steps into a brawl to negotiate between the warring sides, but then ends up defending one side against the other, it is perfectly reasonable to undermine this someone's suitability for the role of referee by pointing out to a contradiction in the different applications of principles. Which is what I did, by taking myself as an example. My mistake was in not realizing that you were actually acting as an advocate for one side rather than a disinterested arbiter. As defense attorney it was your job to point out how just and unassailable your client was and as such, they say, the best defense is a counter-attack, which you carried out with an exemplary devotion to and identification with your client's interests . Anything less might impeach your status within that team. And we can't have that, can we? So no, not schizophrenia but rather, overestimation of another person's judgment skills.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 11:29am

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Jackson: I didn't understand why you assumed Icarus was writing from Iran. He wouldn't be able to post so easily and promptly from there. And please, again, do you mind laying off the sexual invective?

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 11:32am

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"Again, my apologies to all those whom I have accused of racism or worse when they say that Hussein Obama is a secret Muslim. " Oh icarus you are so am-you-zing! Such wit. However you must present this apology to yourself since you are the only one who recently suggested that Obama is a secret Muslim.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 11:46am

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Well, now we know why Peretz apologised..... he's got an award coming up http://tinyurl.com/23c9ocw

- SMacEachern2

September 16, 2010 at 11:57am

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The whole thing reminded me of a similar row that involved Martin Amis a couple of years ago "The row began when Eagleton wrote in an introduction to a revised edition of his primer Ideology: An Introduction that Amis had espoused views appropriate to a "British National Party thug". Eagleton expanded his attack with a piece in the Guardian that wrongly attributed a series of remarks made by Amis to an essay published by the Observer in September 2006. Eagleton suggested Amis had written: "The Muslim community will have to suffer until it gets its house in order. What sort of suffering? Not letting them travel. Deportation - further down the road. Curtailing of freedoms. Strip-searching people who look like they're from the Middle East or from Pakistan ... Discriminatory stuff, until it hurts the whole community and they start getting tough with their children..." Amis rejects the claim that he has ever espoused these views, saying that the remarks were made in a newspaper interview and preceded with the following: "What can we do to raise the price of them doing this? There's a definite urge - don't you have it? - to say ... [etc, etc]." The remarks were not "advocating anything" he continued, they were a thought experiment, merely "conversationally describing an urge - an urge that soon wore off". The novelist went on to "declare that 'harassing the Muslim community in Britain' would be neither moral nor efficacious", but made no apology for making remarks describing an "urge" that the Muslim community should "suffer", nor any attempt to respond to wider concerns over his views concerning Islamism." http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/oct/12/religion.news

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 12:10pm

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Miceelf where in Canada are you? I'm in Toronto? Malahat's in Victoria. Ever get out east, leaving the west where it's the best? Icarus is in Ottawa/Toronto. (Btw, icarus, my daughter's going to be articling in Ottawa for the federal government--civil litigation--starting in the New Year, if the creek don't rise. I hope it'd be okay if get her to make contact with you.) We have to figure out an all Canadian dinner one night, but I can't go unless there's drinking and I don't need to drive. Lemme' know. The attacks on this thread on icarusr--who I disagree with on plenty of things-- are pure bullshit, really vile and amongst the most surprisingly obtuse and stupid things I've ever read around here and, it goes without saying discreditable, of their makers. Someone called him "harem boy"? For fucking shame!

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 12:30pm

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Malahat: "Can a person be hypocritical to oneself?" A welcome philisophical question. We may rationalize to ourselves that which we know is wrong. We may lie to ourselves that which we know is true. We may profess certainty to ourselves that which we know we have doubt." I like those thoughts. It begins at home with integrity measured by the ability to endeavor self honesty. In that sense L'Etat c'est Moi is true. The order of that Estate and the standard by which it shall be measured is the question/answer.

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 12:30pm

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noga1 “Jackson: I didn't understand why you assumed Icarus was writing from Iran.” Some poster above, and I am not going through 300 posts to find it, said that he was in Iran and since he wasn’t corrected I assume that it was true. Apparently not. In any case it is a waste of time responding to Icarusr. His posts are all about himself. He offer himself as an authority.(As a lawyer, as a “Jew” as an Iranian, etc.) He mistakenly thinks that by giving us his credentials and personal history that that proves whatever case he is making. He is a man of many parts, or so he says, and that makes him an expert on any and all topics. He is a pretty shallow dude.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 12:30pm

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Hey, I'm #300.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 12:31pm

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Hey, I'm #300.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 12:31pm

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miccelf: Jacko, this probably begins with the parameters of Self as well. Am I the same person I was five years ago? A year? A day? A minute? Are other current selves more likely, given the actions of past self? Does the aspirational future self count, and if so, under what conditions?" Man oh man. As for us all, that is between you and your Maker. Certainly, there is some continuity, but how much is required for an inconsistency between the current self-pronouncements and the past self's actions to count as hypocrisy? I can only measure this on a personal basis. I find it usually has to do with the extents of my wishing/wanting and projecting that which is beyond my power or station. Maybe you have some thoughts on this?

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 12:49pm

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My previous post should have read, miccelf: "Certainly, there is some continuity, but how much is required for an inconsistency between the current self-pronouncements and the past self's actions to count as hypocrisy?" This was his comment. Just soes ya knows.

- jacko

September 16, 2010 at 12:51pm

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"Hey, I'm #300." Sorry to interfere with your glorious achievement, Basman. Next time I'll let you be 300.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 1:31pm

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Noga: grow up, please. There are no teams. We're just a bunch of individuals trying to sort things out. Neither am I always "on the side" of someone I agree with on a particular issue, or vice-versa. I just think that invective which has become a habit doesn't do any good. I never claimed to be a disinterested arbiter or anything remotely like that, which would be silly as I've expressed some strong opinions here; neither do I have a client (apart from the academic press which is paying me the princely sum of $150 for having read a 425-page manuscript of dense prose -- why did I say yes!?). In any case, the main point (which you didn't address) was about the necessity of soliciting agreement if engaged in a multi-party debate. Or not the necessity so much as the inevitability.

- ironyroad

September 16, 2010 at 1:45pm

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basman, I am not *in* Canada, but I am *of* Canada. Grew up on the east coast, spent 6-7 years in grad school in Montreal. Still go back to MTL about once a year, and was in Toronto for a work meeting last year. I could definitely be persuaded to join a TNR all-Canadian dinner if the timing were right!! I am always looking for an excuse to get back up there. But, Montreal, especially. Oh, poutine, we stand on guard for thee.

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 1:50pm

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basman: Congrats! Really challenging thing to land - and not surprised that she did. By all means - it would be a pleasure. As for dinner - will be in Toronto sometime in October; happy to arrange it. And yes, "harem boy" is one of JD's usual "insults" for me, presumably because "anti-Semite", "Jew-hater", "bigot", "Arab", "Muslim", "self-hating Jew" or whatever else his other insults are were not having an impact. Oh yeah, it came about because I said I hope some Republican is not gay. Connection? With JD, who knows? As he himself has admitted just now, he "thought" someone had said something or another about me (and no one has actually said anything of the kind), assumed that that imaginary person is right, and constructed an entire narrative. And even more amusing, even when he is proven incorrect, he doesn't give up!

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 1:54pm

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Mice: Montreal or Toronto - basman is even more amusing in person than on these boards, and I am certain we could have an interesting dinner. icarusr@gmail.com - let me know when you are coming Canada-side, and we can arrange it.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 1:58pm

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"the main point (which you didn't address) " My post did nothing but address your main point. Go back and read it with the idea that possibly, just possibly, I know what I"m trying to say and you could make the effort to treat it at least with some respect.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 1:59pm

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ick and bas. The check is in the mail. I know I have a conference sometime early in 2011. Will see when and figure out what the wife is doing and then let you all know..... I am of course much LESS interesting in person. and, ick, you have to take responsibiity for your errors. When JD imagined that someone said you were in Iran, it was of course your job to anticipate and correct this error of imagination.

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 2:08pm

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Mice, would it make a difference? They he would say 1) I'm lying; 2) I'm masturbating; 3) he does not read my posts; 4) the point is irrelevant; and 5) I'm an anti-Semite and self-hating Jew and an apologist for Muslims, terrorists and Islamic States (for him, all the same, of course) for not living in Iran. In multiple posts increasing in invective and incoherence.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 2:11pm

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miceelf "basman, I am not *in* Canada, but I am *of* Canada." Figures: "Strange salute: their host was a Nazi dictator, but Canadian athletes at the 1936 Berlin Olympics thought good manners should prevail.(Canadians give Olympic salute)" "The Winnipeg Free Press on August 5, 1936, published a story that threw additional light on the salute issue. A.E.H. Coo reported that "the Canadian Olympic team did not give the Nazi salute when they passed before Der Fuehrer at the opening in the stadium last Saturday; that is, they did not intend to give the Nazi salute. But whatever they did it went over big with the crowd, which went wild." Seems that Canadians are specialists in plausible deniability. "It seemed that the Canadians had given, not the Nazi, but the Olympic salute. The two were almost identical except that in the former the arm is extended straight ahead and at eye level, while in the latter the arm is extended slightly to the right and pointed skyward. A photograph of the opening ceremonies at Amsterdam in 1928 shows athletes giving the Olympic salute as they pass the reviewing stand, as does a photo of the athlete who delivered the Olympic oath at the Antwerp Gaines in 1920. It is easy to see how the two salutes could be confused. When the Olympic salute is given as the saluter … " http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-31134795_ITM

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 2:15pm

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Stop whining, Icarusr. For a poster who shows nothing but contempt for anyone who thinks differently than you do protest too much when people re-pay you in kind. You dish it out but you can’t take it when it’s dished back to you. You are such a bore and not very clever. Family money must have bought you a degree.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 2:19pm

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Hey, someone could persuade me to shlep up to Montreal for something like that, if need be, and it made some short "getting away" sense. But, then again, the big smoke is so gorgeous and uplifting in the dead of winter. On the other hand, my associate James William Rose and I plan to ramble around New England, following out noses, for a few days at the end of October--28th to the 2nd--just to get away for a few days. If anyone companionable wants to have a beer, lemme' know.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 2:19pm

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jd, I understand that you believe that ick and I are both evil incarnate, but you do realize that your equation of Canada with all things Nazi splashes paint on others, correct? it doesn't matter where I'm from, you'd find some example, probably involving people who died before I was born and have no relation to me whatsoever. How is the weather in Samoa?

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 2:21pm

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Noga, how can I treat something like the following with respect? " . . . which you carried out with an exemplary devotion to and identification with your client's interests . Anything less might impeach your status within that team." I don't have a client, I don't indentifiy with a non-existent client's interests. I'm not on any team. I never claimed to be a disinterested arbiter. So how am I supposed to respond to that?

- ironyroad

September 16, 2010 at 2:54pm

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Malahat- I thought the handle was familiar- my connection is the Malahat Review, a small lit journal in BC that years ago turned down some of my writing. Who would have thought so many Canucks were on the spine?

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 3:03pm

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I also recall Trudeau's bit about the elephant in bed with the mouse (that WAS Trudeau, right?) I have a much better excuse than most now living in the US.

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 3:14pm

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miceelf "jd, I understand that you believe that ick and I are both evil incarnate,...." I haven't been paying attention to "ick" so I don't know what you are talking about. You are not evil, miceelf, just on the side of evil.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 3:17pm

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Ok you Canucks, you can have the thread.

- jdyer

September 16, 2010 at 3:17pm

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Thank you jdyer, we salute you: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_xU32FZn9RvI/SzrbfWYLYAI/AAAAAAAAABM/I0W2iTGsOUA/s1600-h/black+power+olympics.jpg

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 3:28pm

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My national anthem as sung in Neo Doo Wop http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzuOSaN5CQU

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 3:30pm

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ironyroad; Some time ago you tried to make a point by displacing us to an army base and making me a major. I didn't accuse you of lacking gravitas. I went along with your experiment and we reached some sort of understanding if not agreement. It was well received and the point made. End of story. Why can't you accept a similar type of displacement, in which I used a certain Rumpolian language to make a point without turning it into a conspiracy theory or me into a paranoid schisophreniac? BTW, between you, icarus, miceelf and one or two others, soon you will run out of terms for criminally insane disorders by which to describe me. You should use such terminology with great caution, never mind the temptation, lest you dilute the language to a point of meaninglessness.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 3:38pm

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malahat: "either a positive change (e.g. someone who evolves ethically) or a negative change (e.g., someone who devolves ethically), but not necessarily hypocrisy." I would consider hypocrisy of this type as the first step towards ethical devolution. Exactly the point at which a fissure occurs between an ethical imperative and inclination. According to Paul Ricoeur “Evil is, in the literal sense of the word, perversion, that is, a reversal of the order that requires respect for law to be placed above inclination. It is a matter of a misuse of a free choice... The propensity for evil affects the use of freedom, the capacity to act out of duty – in short, the capacity for being autonomous.”

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 3:44pm

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I mean "inconsistency between... current self-pronouncements and current actions"

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 3:50pm

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Brigadier General Malahat: I am really no good at giving people orders and they never listen anyway, so I'd like to return the honour with the understanding that rejection of a promotion entails an immediate dishonorable discharge. Like Ferdinand, I would rather smell flowers than fight in bullfights. I remain yours faithfully, etc. P.S. In celebration of my dishonorable discharge I'm giving a little brunch Sunday two weeks from now. We'll be reciting our homemade poems and singing kumbaya songs. Organic orange juice will be served. On the menu, very virtuous sandwiches, morally-upright pancakes and my own special piece de resistance, the tofu cheesecake. Quite tasteless but very good for the soul.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 4:03pm

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Niki Yanofsky is over rated: maybe when she gets some years and experience under her belt. After all: You don't know what love is until you've learned the meaning of the Blues. Until you've loved a love you had to lose: You don't know what love is. You don't know how lips burn until you've kissed and had to pay the cost; Until you've flipped your heart and you have lost: You don't know what love is. Do you know how a lost heart fears the thought of reminiscing? And lips that taste of tears lose their taste for kissing. You don't know how hearts ache for love that cannot live yet never dies, Until you've faced each dawn with sleepless eyes: You don't know what love is. You don't know what love is.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 4:04pm

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Going for 400: keep up the good work!

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 4:05pm

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It was wrong of me to ask if noga she had Aspberger's syndrome, but I know of no recorded instance of someone with Aspberger's being found "criminally insane." People with Aspberger's are sometimes very high-functioning and at other times very impaired. They are no more likely to engage in criminal behavior than anyone else, and, likely, somewhat less likely. Schizophrenics as well, high profile anomalies aside, are usually more of a danger to themselves than to anyone else. It's very common that mental illness inspires fear in others, but that fear is usually unfounded.

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 4:11pm

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Yes, Noga, I understand -- but tone counts too. My sketch was intended to raise a slight smile and defuse some tension while possibly feeling out some borders of agreement. I felt (maybe wrongly, I'm an impaired-judgment guy, remember) your Rumpolian displacement had a sharper edge to it. Indeed, you postively rejected agreement as a reasonable goal. I never said a word about conspiracy (I just said I don't think there are teams in the sense I thought you meant it). The schizophrenic remark was attached to a general point about whether soliciting agreement was at least some part of entering a debate. Making a general point does not automatically suggest that all elements of the point apply to the interlocutor at any given moment.

- ironyroad

September 16, 2010 at 4:20pm

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...Lady in Satin... Perhaps her Highness's greatest record. Perhaps one of the greatest translations of pain into art, one of the most brilliant in that whereas we usually separate the artist while doing art from the artist as a person "doing life", in Lady In Satin Billie Holiday, to me, blurs the difference, singing while drugging her life away, on a terrible downward spiral, all as manifest in her singing, but only enhancing the genius of her artistry, not diminishing it a whit.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 4:21pm

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malahat -- you carry the loneliness of command with an admirable sense of duty. Paris. I'll always have Paris.

- ironyroad

September 16, 2010 at 4:22pm

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Malahat: You'll see me fight in bullfights before I agree to be called a "conscientious objector". Ferdinand likes to smell the flowers but it doesn't mean he is not prepared to fight for his little patch of flowers. He is Ferdinand, not some spoiled lapdog.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 4:24pm

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"but tone counts too" Does it, ironyroad? I didn't notice any such concern for delicacy in your endorsement of icarus's flatulant rhetorics. Ah, but those were not aimed at you but at someone else. OK. Please! Let's not start the whole conversation again. No. I don't expect you to endorse my rhetorical antics. Again, just an example for that double standard of yours.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 4:35pm

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52 more to go: now 51.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 4:41pm

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You know what: I don't have that record, not so aware of it. Note to self: get it, listen to it, listen again; listen again; listen again; play Lady in Satin, listen again, again, again, think about them both; formulate a hypothesis, get poor victims --most likely my daughters--to listen with me, again and again, come to a conclusion. Tell Malahat.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 5:10pm

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46 now 45. There's a syrupy song: I Think We'll Make It! Not so sure about 400, losing strength, will's going, fading out, can't make keyboard work any mo.....................

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 5:13pm

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More like the song with the chorus "I can't go for that. I can't go for that. No can do. No can do."

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 5:20pm

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43

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 5:20pm

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42

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 5:21pm

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And so on. Back to Sarah Palin's presidential ambitions or whatever.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 5:22pm

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Noga, I have never said or implied that you suffer from a criminal disorder. As a matter of fact, though I am not a criminal lawyer, I can confirm that there is no such thing as a "criminal disorder" - indeed, the one clear psychiatric disorder that is at the root of most serious crimes - sociopathology - may not be pleaded as a defence. We do not, in Canada, imprison people because of a disorder; we sometimes let them off, but that, even you can appreciate, is a totally different thing. Now, I do think you are a malicious serial-distorter and a liar, but they are not disorders, nor in themselves criminal, and certainly not "criminal disorders", just awful character flaws. As I have explained before, for this reason I have no interest in engaging in a discussion with you, and have largely avoided it, despite your many provocations. I responded to some of the more idiotic of your comments on this thread only out of respect for Irony. He seems to have a lot more time for your tantrums than is reasonable, but isn't diversity a wonderful thing. I will go back to ignoring your poison pen and your intentional misreadings and the reams and reams of unoriginal goop you dump on the Spine. You can of course, if you want, continue to comment on whatever I post, in whatever tone you wish; it is always interesting to read what new word you take out of that well-worn thesaurus of yours (or your vaunted "saved files") to describe my posts (interesting in the sense, of course, that being sprayed by a skunk or run over by a truck is interesting). And I cannot stop you from stating or implying that I am an anti-Semite or in the pay of Mullah Omar as soon as I sneeze in the Spine, just as you can't seem to stop JD or Peretz from abasing themselves with his drunken droollings. So, you know, whatever makes your tofu-cheesecake life more pleasant.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 5:22pm

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40

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 5:22pm

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Basman, since I know you are hoping that this miserable thread reaches 400, I decided to help you reach that noble goal. And I also want to take advantage of the fact that you are engaged here at the moment to apologize for letting the conversation about Kermode drop. I have read half-way through chapter 4 (which is my least favorite so far), but the third was quite interesting and deserves a good chat. I'd like to finish the damn book so that I can my mind around the whole thing before continuing our conversation. I'm up to my neck in tourist season at the moment and will pick up the baton again as soon as I can swing it.

- willjames77

September 16, 2010 at 5:56pm

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I was listening last night to one of my favourite songs, " My Funny Valentine" - two version of it back to back. Ella - she has a voice like Gruyère double-cream - on buttered toast. She is the Bailey's of Jazz singers. You let yourself enjoy her magic, but you are never persuaded that she much cares for the object of her song. It's like appreciating the beauty of a runway model - on TV: lovely, cold, distant and unreachable. But Billie - every inflection, every vowel, speaks of pain and of love. She has seen it all; experienced it all; known it all. You try to imagine the weak chin, the funny looks, the ungreek figure. You know she's in love with this creature. She's Incan chocolate - sweet, bitter and hot; she is like an 18-yo single malt from Skye, deep, peaty and smokey. She is the lover you want to have on your side when it is cold and miserable outside.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 5:57pm

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Noga, thanks for that spectacular cover of the Animals' classic cri de coeur. I'm not sure whether it's worse to be continually misunderstood and misrepresented, or to feel that anything one says is like pissing into the wind. But I do hope you have the good sense to relax and listen to some tasty music instead to responding to icarusr's latest inflammatory dreck. And just when I was starting to feel that he had conducted himself with dignity and restraint throughout Jackson's ad hominem assaults, he has to start throwing pies again like a dumb clown.

- willjames77

September 16, 2010 at 6:09pm

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Icarus said: "Now, I do think you are a malicious serial-distorter and a liar, but they are not disorders, nor in themselves criminal, and certainly not "criminal disorders", just awful character flaws." ________ Icarus: ""I'm of very mixed background, one side tracing back to the Prophet Mohammed” Noga: Hmm. Like Saddam Hussein. I always knew icarus was very special. Never mind. This explains a great deal. http://cityofbrass.blogspot.com/2003/12/saddam-is-not-descendant-of-prophet.html Here is how icarus reads "a great deal" "I'm just like Saddam Hussein (and about fifteen million others) in that respect. And have you noticed that Barack Hussein Obama not only shares the same name as Saddam, but also is a negro, like Willie Horton and Thabo Mbeki? This would explain a great deal, according to you. His being Muslim, Kenyan and, let's be frank, a negro. Just as my 1/1028th part Arab lineage explains a great deal." ___________ It's the rhetorical fallacy known as the noise to signal ratio. Noise expands to fill the empty space when signal is scarce.

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 6:19pm

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Malahat, It was nice to come across your Shakespeare quote (...to thine own self be true, and you can never be false to any man). It sounds so compellingly true, but a word of caution is in order. After all, this is Polonius speaking. Everything he says is received wisdom that he is passing on to his son, Laertes, before sending him off into the world. His speech is really one truism after another, so there's a subtle undercurrent of irony throughout the scene. He is good with words, full of them, in fact, and he knows how everything should be. Yet, none of this purported wisdom helps him stay alive for very long. Polonius' speech is actually based on the topos of the Last Will and Testament of a Renaissance gentleman. In those days, in addition to the merely legal aspect of who got how much, final wills were often filled with moral exhortations and warnings and admonishments so that the young heir would be guided by the wisdom which the deceased had acquired during his long years. Once the old man was dead, you could take the money and blow off the advice. Polonius has a bit of this quality of the old fool trying to teach the young man how to live. "Never be false to any man" is advice that Hamlet wisely ignores -- which helps him survive in his treacherous, false world until the final act.

- willjames77

September 16, 2010 at 6:37pm

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Willjames: Yes, wasn't it a spectacular rendition? I almost forgot about it when jacko's ruminations about love suddenly lit up the memory of this song. Don't know why but there it was. The flamenco rendition was an added bonus as I am pretty crazy about the flamenco. (Tango being the second favourite as in the Gotan project). The Spaniards know how to do the "cri de coeur", the duende: La Soleá / Federico Garcia Lorca Vestida con mantos negros piensa que el mundo es chiquito y el corazón es inmenso. Vestida con mantos negros. Piensa que el suspiro tierno y el grito, desaparecen en la corriente del viento. Vestida con mantos negros. Se dejó el balcón abierto y el alba por el balcón desembocó todo el cielo. ˇ Ay yayayayay, que vestida con mantos negros! _____________ I will now try to heed that good advice :)

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 6:39pm

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Ah well, WillJ, even a dumb clown can have his own dignity ;); and pies instead of outright distortions, or comparisons to Saddam Hussein, or the imputation of "criminal disorder" labelling ... I'd say a measure of restraint was still evident in my response. Imagine someone says, "I have a German background" or "I am distantly related to King Otto IV", and the response is, "Like Adolph Hitler. ... That explains a great deal." How would you respond? Anyway - off to see the Wizard.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 6:42pm

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Malahat: I love Ella's live Mack the Knife - it does sound entirely natural, and she is an excellent performer. (I have Pure Ella and the two Armstrong discs.) She, for me, is background to a glass of Petit Chablis in the company of close friends, leading to a game of Trivial Pursuit. Billie I would listen to drinking a glass of Margaux over a candlelight, across from a lover. Or alone, after a bad break-up. And never with white wine.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 6:51pm

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Hmm. So icarus thinks Saddam Hussein is comparable to Hitler. Does that entail an implicit agreement with Bush'es decision to go to war in Iraq?

- noga1

September 16, 2010 at 6:54pm

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Forgive me quoting myself but I wrote this once: Claudius puts Polonius between himself and Hamlet after Hamlet refuses to accede to him. As Polonius mediates between the threat posed to Claudius by Hamlet's brooding gloom and Claudius himself, he appears to be the wise counsellor and politic courtier eager to do his king's bidding. In truth, he is a sententious fool devoted to power. While there is no reason to think he knows of the fratricide, he is a vessel carrying Claudius' poison into the body politic. Polonius is sophist to Hamlet's philosopher. In the litany of his advice to Laertes, both triteness and his own misdoings belie nearly every word he says. While Hamlet scorns Gertrude for resorting to "seems," Polonius trumpets appearances: Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, But not expressed in fancy; rich, not gaudy, For the apparel oft proclaims the man, And they in France of the best of rank and station Are of a most select and generous, chief in that. (1.3.70-74) Polonius, who counsels his son to himself to be true, is set to spy on him and will, effectively, broker Ophelia with Hamlet for the king. Opposite to Hamlet, he has no capacity for irony. Rather, his spying and proceeding by indirection parody his profession of courtly wisdom and betray his obtuseness. That is to say, rather than using his intellect to get at the meaning of things, Polonius, mired in surfaces, hides behind curtains and behind others to inform himself so that he can report back to Claudius in a delusion of discovery. So, for instance, he tells Claudius that Hamlet's frustration over Ophelia's refusal of him—which conduct Polonius has induced—is the cause of his gloom. His brokerage, almost pimping, is evident in his sullied advice to Ophelia, who herself is an innocent and is inclined to respond in kind to Hamlet's "holy vows of heaven" (1.3.114). Polonius besmirches the possibility of love between Ophelia and Hamlet. Wrong about virtually everything, he—the self-assumed master of indirection—accuses Hamlet of attempting to ensnare her only to satisfy his lust. Like Laertes, Polonius’ preoccupation with form condemns Ophelia to what he insists is the inferiority of her rank. Polonius' long lecture to Laertes contains a paradox that anticipates large and tragic implications going to the very heart of the play's meaning. Rooted in common sense and the precepts of the day, Polonius' advice has some wisdom. Some of what he says will reverberate most deeply in Hamlet's own life: Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel, But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatched, unfledged courage. Beware Of entrance to a quarrel; but being in, Bear't that th' opposed may beware of thee. (1.3.62-67) These pieces of advice mix commonplace wisdom together with triteness. Yet, despite their commonplace, they vibrate with portent for what they intimate in relation to Hamlet. In contrast to Polonius’ stock wisdom to Laertes, Hamlet will don distraction—an “antic in contrast to Polonius’ stock wisdom to Laertes, Hamlet will don distraction—an “antic disposition”—to navigate the meanings of the world. Seeing better than most, he will be overwhelmed, and in his madness will contend militarily with reason. He will be unmoored by what he sees that he will both see deeply and see wrongly. Probing depths, he will often misjudge what is right before his eyes and what others less mindful can plainly see. In Hamlet futility lies in the impossibility of mediating that paradox.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 7:41pm

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23

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 7:41pm

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Malahat, icarus, anyone else: Ella Fitzgerald is a great, great singer but she couldn't sing the blues as she herself admitted. So for as much as I admire her singing because I'm blues oriented, I have a preference for Dinah Washington. (And Little Esther mimicked her passably). The lady who could put all this together and sing any which way was Sarah Vaughan. But if I'm going to a desert island with one record by a woman jazz/blues singer, it's for me a toss up between Bessie Smith and Billie Holiday. Just listen Bessie Smith sing Back Water Blues: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WptTtz9N3ok ...When it rains five days and the skies turn dark as night When it rains five days and the skies turn dark as night Then trouble's takin' place in the lowlands at night I woke up this mornin', can't even get out of my door I woke up this mornin', can't even get out of my door There's been enough trouble to make a poor girl wonder where she want to go Then they rowed a little boat about five miles 'cross the pond Then they rowed a little boat about five miles 'cross the pond I packed all my clothes, throwed them in and they rowed me along When it thunders and lightnin' and when the wind begins to blow When it thunders and lightnin' and the wind begins to blow There's thousands of people ain't got no place to go Then I went and stood upon some high old lonesome hill Then I went and stood upon some high old lonesome hill Then looked down on the house were I used to live Backwater blues done call me to pack my things and go Backwater blues done call me to pack my things and go 'Cause my house fell down and I can't live there no more Mmm, I can't move no more Mmm, I can't move no more There ain't no place for a poor old girl to go...

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 7:59pm

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James Baldwin said when he went to Europe to write he was living for a while in some Scandinavian country and from his small cottage he was armed with his type writer a little record player and Bessie Smith's record of Black Water Blues. He stared at every day from his desk out a window to a desolately snowy landscape and listened over and over again to the Bessie Smith recording. He said he was powerfully moved when Bessie Smith sang "Cause my house fell down and I can't live there no more" as he thought it a great testament to the human spirit's ability to endure, a kind of indomitably in the face of great undoing.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:05pm

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When Sam Phillips was talking about the second generation of great blues men like B.B. King and especially Howlin' Wolf he said, unforgettably and magnificently, "This is where the soul of man never dies." Back Water Blues makes me think of what he said more than any song I know.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:11pm

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Hey Willjames7 what's with you and and tourist season: sounds intriguing?

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:12pm

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19

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:13pm

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Will james just to fill space, I feel like I'm filibustering, but i don't give a shit: a worthy goal is a worthy goal, here's a conversation I had with a friend of mine still on the first lecture. I have to get on to the other lectures especially since you are making headway: _____________________ Roger: I found the chapter very clear over-all, if a little fancy and allusive, and the only thing I really disliked was the phrase "in the middest," though I can't think of a better one. Kermode is trying to persuade an educated secular audience which believes that it is relatively free of myths (which are reserved for the religious primarily) that their thinking is permeated by at least one myth that very sophisticated novelists try to escape, but which is, finally inescapable. One can say that one does not structure one's sense of things by stories with beginnings middles and ends but such thinking seems quite built in. Thus the imminence-immanence idea is about how what might appear not to fit the idea that we are always making stories, what it does is to move the end to the moment. That seems very right to me. When I say, as I routinely do, that some event that is taken to be deeply meaningful should not be taken so seriously, I am usually met with something like hostility, since not taking it as a a crisis deprives it of meaning, empties things out. So, the current economic "crisis" is just another case of people not knowing the consequences of their actions and we will make more or less satisfactory adjustments, and life will go on pretty much before but with some changes that appear significant and may or may not be. That is a dead bore, and I am uninterested in the actual historical detail, so there is nothing much left to care about. Of course there is the immediate urgency of the doing for those who are historical actors, and when something happens in my life I feel all the urgency, anxiety, etc, that goes with being troubled. But I always suspect myself and others when we try to make sense of what we do in these matters, and I try to focus on whether the action contemplated is the right one, and since that is usually determined by things I cannot be aware of (it just seems the right thing to do) there is no story. The centrality of story to fictions is long established, and Kermode sees fictions as secular versions of myths, and I agree; they are little bits of coherence and a coherence that is understood to be fictional, instead of the big myths which are taken to be true. Kermode thus carries on the process of making us self-conscious even as he knows that we can nevef quite out-smart ourselves and give up the need for making what is contingent into something coherent. Itzik's points: 1. I did not think Kermode was much concerned with an ur-pattern, despite the passage quoted. Does that just refer to beginning, middle and end, as the pattern, ie one without content? 2. I didn't understand this "contradiction." I thought he was trying to say that we deal more in crisis talk (like the coming mid-term election, the current down-turn, etc.) than end of the world talk (though the environmental movement has some of that). The "cure" for such thinking when it comes to reality (not fictions where one enjoys the story), is detailed history, which always dissolves the big pictures, and makes the world seem contingent, and yet we are responsible for making it, which is very uncomfortable. And so the lecture ends. ______________________________ Me and Roger: Me: Roger, on some of what you said: ____________________________________________________________________________ Quoting Roger: “Kermode is trying to persuade an educated secular audience which believes that it is relatively free of myths (which are reserved for the religious primarily) that their thinking is permeated by at least one myth that very sophisticated novelists try to escape, but which is, finally inescapable.” Me: What is that myth? Or, perhaps, what’s an example of one of these myths. Is there some text in the lecture that makes this clear? Roger: There is no single myth. The classic example would be the Christian story, but Marx's account of things is another. The Greek and Romans had a bunch. Secular people tend to believe that they are not under the sway of such stories in their view of things. _________________________________________________________________________ Quoting Roger: “One can say that one does not structure one's sense of things by stories with beginnings middles and ends but such thinking seems quite built in.” _________________________________________________________________________________ Me: I’m missing this. I understand what you are saying but surely it’s not true about how we are in the world. Surely we structure our sense of things, our experiences, by thinking about the linear passing of time through them. I can’t imagine thinking about, making sense of, our experiences in the world otherwise. Roger: Kermode and I disagree. We structure things with stories. The people in your divorce cases had conflicting stories about what happened. I don't think of time passign through my experences, time is just the dimension in which stories occur. (However, sometimes when things happen in a certain way, we say, "I feel like I am in a movie," meaning, I think, that normally we don't feel like part of a plot and it feels unnatural when that happens. That should modify Kermode's claim that we always see ourselves inside a story. ___________________________________________________________________________________ Quoting Roger: “Thus the imminence-immanence idea is about how what might appear not to fit the idea that we are always making stories, what it does is to move the end to the moment. That seems very right to me.” __________________________________________________________________________ Me: This is unclear to me. I’m not sure of what you are saying. Apart from me not getting clearly your point, my understanding of the imminent/immanent distinction for Kermode is that when we know no longer believe in magical ends, like the Apocalypse, we lose our sense of imminence, of the End, of the lesser importance of our lives in relation to the End, and given the terrible, impossible-to-take-in, evil of our world, and our understanding of our temporality, and our contingency, we experience our lives as a series of crises, every moment a kind of end, hence the move from imminence to immanence. Roger: I think the point was (and I do not defend it) that the sense of crisis is a sort of mini-version of the sense of apocalypse, ie apocalypse now. It is the typical modern version of apocalyptic thinking. The day after the crisis we move on to the next one, just like people are undaunted by the fact that the end did not come when predicted. So crisis is a present apocalypse. (Now not about to me, immanent not imminent.) ______________________________________________________________________________ quoting Roger: “When I say, as I routinely do, that some event that is taken to be deeply meaningful should not be taken so seriously, I am usually met with something like hostility, since not taking it as a a crisis deprives it of meaning, empties things out.” So, the current economic "crisis" is just another case of people not knowing the consequences of their actions and we will make more or less satisfactory adjustments, and life will go on pretty much before but with some changes that appear significant and may or may not be. That is a dead bore, and I am uninterested in the actual historical detail, so there is nothing much left to care about. Of course there is the immediate urgency of the doing for those who are historical actors, and when something happens in my life I feel all the urgency, anxiety, etc, that goes with being troubled. But I always suspect myself and others when we try to make sense of what we do in these matters, and I try to focus on whether the action contemplated is the right one, and since that is usually determined by things I cannot be aware of (it just seems the right thing to do) there is no story.” _________________________________________________________________________________ Me: Well, I get what you routinely do and what bores you, though I’d think some of that might depend on things like the event, who’s affected by it and how. But whatever you routinely do, you do. In any event, though, this, as I just tried to note, doesn’t seem to me to be what Kermode is talking about concerning crisis. If you mean that it is, might you point me to some clarifying text? Roger: On a personal level: My wife and I have a fight, I have a story about why I am angry, she has a story about why that is not justified. Neither can be proven, but we need them. But. what matters is how we manage to get beyond the story battle, and restore good relations. If we get trapped in the stories there is no resolution. I think many people think about poltitics as conflciting stories and they engage in endless different accounts, but what matters is how the community manages to live together, the laws, which make it possible to move on and not fight about who is right. This is me not Kermode. __________________________________________________________________________________ Quoting Roger: Itzik's points 1.I did not think Kermode was much concerned with an ur-pattern, despite the passage quoted. Does that just refer to beginning, middle and end, as the pattern, ie one without content.” ___________________________________________________________________________ Me: Gee, I thought he was quite concerned with it. In fact I thought it underpinned his entire lecture, the notion of the primeval pattern underlying the golden bird’s notes. I don’t have his book open now but doesn’t he start his first lecture by quoting the poem that has the golden bird singing? Also why need we guess at what he takes the "primeval pattern" to be? Can’t he just spill those beans? Roger: “2. I didn't understand this "contradiction." I thought he was trying to say that we deal more in crisis talk (like the coming mid-term election, the current down-turn, etc.) than end of the world talk (though the environmental movement has some of that).” Me: Well, what does he mean by saying we have the means to—and I think he’s saying we should— “construct an eschatology”? Again, I have a different understanding of what he means by crisis, and still don’t know how we construct that thing when we have, as I read this lecture, foregone any understanding of a theory of ends.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:22pm

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Will james just to fill space, I feel like I'm filibustering, but i don't give a shit: a worthy goal is a worthy goal, here's a conversation I had with a friend of mine still on the first lecture. I have to get on to the other lectures especially since you are making headway: _____________________ Roger: I found the chapter very clear over-all, if a little fancy and allusive, and the only thing I really disliked was the phrase "in the middest," though I can't think of a better one. Kermode is trying to persuade an educated secular audience which believes that it is relatively free of myths (which are reserved for the religious primarily) that their thinking is permeated by at least one myth that very sophisticated novelists try to escape, but which is, finally inescapable. One can say that one does not structure one's sense of things by stories with beginnings middles and ends but such thinking seems quite built in. Thus the imminence-immanence idea is about how what might appear not to fit the idea that we are always making stories, what it does is to move the end to the moment. That seems very right to me. When I say, as I routinely do, that some event that is taken to be deeply meaningful should not be taken so seriously, I am usually met with something like hostility, since not taking it as a a crisis deprives it of meaning, empties things out. So, the current economic "crisis" is just another case of people not knowing the consequences of their actions and we will make more or less satisfactory adjustments, and life will go on pretty much before but with some changes that appear significant and may or may not be. That is a dead bore, and I am uninterested in the actual historical detail, so there is nothing much left to care about. Of course there is the immediate urgency of the doing for those who are historical actors, and when something happens in my life I feel all the urgency, anxiety, etc, that goes with being troubled. But I always suspect myself and others when we try to make sense of what we do in these matters, and I try to focus on whether the action contemplated is the right one, and since that is usually determined by things I cannot be aware of (it just seems the right thing to do) there is no story. The centrality of story to fictions is long established, and Kermode sees fictions as secular versions of myths, and I agree; they are little bits of coherence and a coherence that is understood to be fictional, instead of the big myths which are taken to be true. Kermode thus carries on the process of making us self-conscious even as he knows that we can nevef quite out-smart ourselves and give up the need for making what is contingent into something coherent. Itzik's points: 1. I did not think Kermode was much concerned with an ur-pattern, despite the passage quoted. Does that just refer to beginning, middle and end, as the pattern, ie one without content? 2. I didn't understand this "contradiction." I thought he was trying to say that we deal more in crisis talk (like the coming mid-term election, the current down-turn, etc.) than end of the world talk (though the environmental movement has some of that). The "cure" for such thinking when it comes to reality (not fictions where one enjoys the story), is detailed history, which always dissolves the big pictures, and makes the world seem contingent, and yet we are responsible for making it, which is very uncomfortable. And so the lecture ends. ______________________________ Me and Roger: Me: Roger, on some of what you said: ____________________________________________________________________________ Quoting Roger: “Kermode is trying to persuade an educated secular audience which believes that it is relatively free of myths (which are reserved for the religious primarily) that their thinking is permeated by at least one myth that very sophisticated novelists try to escape, but which is, finally inescapable.” Me: What is that myth? Or, perhaps, what’s an example of one of these myths. Is there some text in the lecture that makes this clear? Roger: There is no single myth. The classic example would be the Christian story, but Marx's account of things is another. The Greek and Romans had a bunch. Secular people tend to believe that they are not under the sway of such stories in their view of things. _________________________________________________________________________ Quoting Roger: “One can say that one does not structure one's sense of things by stories with beginnings middles and ends but such thinking seems quite built in.” _________________________________________________________________________________ Me: I’m missing this. I understand what you are saying but surely it’s not true about how we are in the world. Surely we structure our sense of things, our experiences, by thinking about the linear passing of time through them. I can’t imagine thinking about, making sense of, our experiences in the world otherwise. Roger: Kermode and I disagree. We structure things with stories. The people in your divorce cases had conflicting stories about what happened. I don't think of time passign through my experences, time is just the dimension in which stories occur. (However, sometimes when things happen in a certain way, we say, "I feel like I am in a movie," meaning, I think, that normally we don't feel like part of a plot and it feels unnatural when that happens. That should modify Kermode's claim that we always see ourselves inside a story. ___________________________________________________________________________________ Quoting Roger: “Thus the imminence-immanence idea is about how what might appear not to fit the idea that we are always making stories, what it does is to move the end to the moment. That seems very right to me.” __________________________________________________________________________ Me: This is unclear to me. I’m not sure of what you are saying. Apart from me not getting clearly your point, my understanding of the imminent/immanent distinction for Kermode is that when we know no longer believe in magical ends, like the Apocalypse, we lose our sense of imminence, of the End, of the lesser importance of our lives in relation to the End, and given the terrible, impossible-to-take-in, evil of our world, and our understanding of our temporality, and our contingency, we experience our lives as a series of crises, every moment a kind of end, hence the move from imminence to immanence. Roger: I think the point was (and I do not defend it) that the sense of crisis is a sort of mini-version of the sense of apocalypse, ie apocalypse now. It is the typical modern version of apocalyptic thinking. The day after the crisis we move on to the next one, just like people are undaunted by the fact that the end did not come when predicted. So crisis is a present apocalypse. (Now not about to me, immanent not imminent.) ______________________________________________________________________________ quoting Roger: “When I say, as I routinely do, that some event that is taken to be deeply meaningful should not be taken so seriously, I am usually met with something like hostility, since not taking it as a a crisis deprives it of meaning, empties things out.” So, the current economic "crisis" is just another case of people not knowing the consequences of their actions and we will make more or less satisfactory adjustments, and life will go on pretty much before but with some changes that appear significant and may or may not be. That is a dead bore, and I am uninterested in the actual historical detail, so there is nothing much left to care about. Of course there is the immediate urgency of the doing for those who are historical actors, and when something happens in my life I feel all the urgency, anxiety, etc, that goes with being troubled. But I always suspect myself and others when we try to make sense of what we do in these matters, and I try to focus on whether the action contemplated is the right one, and since that is usually determined by things I cannot be aware of (it just seems the right thing to do) there is no story.” _________________________________________________________________________________ Me: Well, I get what you routinely do and what bores you, though I’d think some of that might depend on things like the event, who’s affected by it and how. But whatever you routinely do, you do. In any event, though, this, as I just tried to note, doesn’t seem to me to be what Kermode is talking about concerning crisis. If you mean that it is, might you point me to some clarifying text? Roger: On a personal level: My wife and I have a fight, I have a story about why I am angry, she has a story about why that is not justified. Neither can be proven, but we need them. But. what matters is how we manage to get beyond the story battle, and restore good relations. If we get trapped in the stories there is no resolution. I think many people think about poltitics as conflciting stories and they engage in endless different accounts, but what matters is how the community manages to live together, the laws, which make it possible to move on and not fight about who is right. This is me not Kermode. __________________________________________________________________________________ Quoting Roger: Itzik's points 1.I did not think Kermode was much concerned with an ur-pattern, despite the passage quoted. Does that just refer to beginning, middle and end, as the pattern, ie one without content.” ___________________________________________________________________________ Me: Gee, I thought he was quite concerned with it. In fact I thought it underpinned his entire lecture, the notion of the primeval pattern underlying the golden bird’s notes. I don’t have his book open now but doesn’t he start his first lecture by quoting the poem that has the golden bird singing? Also why need we guess at what he takes the "primeval pattern" to be? Can’t he just spill those beans? Roger: “2. I didn't understand this "contradiction." I thought he was trying to say that we deal more in crisis talk (like the coming mid-term election, the current down-turn, etc.) than end of the world talk (though the environmental movement has some of that).” Me: Well, what does he mean by saying we have the means to—and I think he’s saying we should— “construct an eschatology”? Again, I have a different understanding of what he means by crisis, and still don’t know how we construct that thing when we have, as I read this lecture, foregone any understanding of a theory of ends.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:22pm

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Willjames7 is a friend of mine: I'm no willjames7.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:23pm

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12

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:24pm

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Would you all let me have the honor of being 400?

- MOLLYSIMON

September 16, 2010 at 8:24pm

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I've been following this thread for a long time and mostly kept my mouth shut. Shouldn't I be the one who gets the honor?

- MOLLYSIMON

September 16, 2010 at 8:25pm

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Sure thing but how we do do that, ensure it enforce it, but be our guest.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:25pm

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7

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:25pm

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It's 8:50 my time. I'll be back at ten to get this thing finished off. If I need to I'll get it to 399 and leave the crowning touch to my bride to be in the next life. I told her that I already called the caterers.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:51pm

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But before I go, I can't resist noting that the great Anderson Silva will be rematching with Chael Sonnen early in 2011. I'm heartened that David Mamet, that ex liberal, champions MMA.

- basman

September 16, 2010 at 8:54pm

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Noga: "So icarus thinks Saddam Hussein is comparable to Hitler. Does that entail an implicit agreement with Bush'es decision to go to war in Iraq?" In kind, yes, but not in degree. And not just implicitly. I am wary of historical comparisons to the Nazi-era, but by 1990 we knew enough about him and his regime to make the comparison apt. I said so expressly in a paper I published in 1994, setting out a legal defence of the first war against Iraq. Then, the unambiguous authority existed under international law to invade - even if the basis for the authority was, unfortunately, muddied by legal obfuscation. The situation in 2003 was considerably more complicated. As I think I have mentioned repeatedly in these pages, throughout 2002 and 2003, I supported the invasion of Iraq. At the time, I did not agree with Bush's stated reasons for the invasion, nor was I persuaded that there were WMD's involved. There were two reasons for my strong advocacy for war, at the time. First, in my paper on Iraq, I noted the importance of a Realpolitik approach to the enforcement of international law; since then, and especially during the Yugoslav civil war, I argued that "international law" meant more than just protection of boundaries, and must include protection of populations - in other words, I strongly supported "humanitarian intervention", which invariably means war in the name of human rights. The Realpolitik aspect of it was to recognise that we cannot solve one problem while creating a bigger one (say, risk nuclear war with Russia over the Chechen) - but that, our paralysis in one theatre, for example Chechnya, should not imply a universal paralysis to react to any and all mass slaughters or genocides. And so, while condemning Russian slaughter in Chechnya or Chinese suppression of Tibet, I would not have thought it appropriate to take military action against either country; at the same time, throughout the nineties I was strongly in favour of Nato intervention to stop the Yugoslav war, and when it finally came, and how it came about, it was, in my view, the right thing to do. In the same vein, in 2002 and 2003, Iraq had already demonstrated the capacity and the willingness to engage in genocide. More to the point, unlike 1994 in Rwanda, the US was willing to enforce international law and put the lives of its young men and women at risk for that purpose - the means and the willingness were there, and the fact that Bush II had a different motive did not, in my Realpolitik framework, matter. Seize the opportunity for the enforcement of humanitarian law! And so the US did, and Saddam Hussein was toppled and punished. And good riddance. Second, many people forget that the initial act of Iraqi outlawry was on September 22, 1980 - repeated ten years later. Throughout the 1990s, Iraq was an active threat to the region, it had flouted international law repeatedly over a generation, and continued to thumb its note at the will of the international community. By 2002, negotiations had reached their limits and for what we now know were demented reasons, Saddam refused to disarm. Again, the issue was not the possibility of WMD - the "absence of evidence" - but his clear outlaw behaviour in the preceding generation, and the active threat to peace and security in the region. And I wish the war had been sold on that - in my view, correct - basis, rather than the flimsy and unsupportable ones of WMD and al-Qaeda (sadly, politically necessary to put the lives of US and British soldiers on the line). But the theoretical, legal and practical support for the Wars of the Bushes did not mean that I agreed with the means or the approach. Rumsfeld and Cheney were and are wholly responsible for the chaos that ensued. 135,000 troops to occupy Iraq? Chalabi as the chief liberator? General Fuckwit and Berman to the rescue? No plan for rebuilding Iraq? "Stuff happens"? It was Bush II's assault on reason, human decency, the US Constitution, international law, simple strategic planning, and Abu Ghraib that turned me against Iraq II. As I wrote in my apology, and apologia to friends, in supporting the war, I had forgotten my Cardinal Rule of Government Policy: the bigger the plans, the likelier that it will be screwed up. And this one was screwed up. Badly. At every level. I wrote to a friend after Abu Ghraib, "I did not mean this to happen"; and I recalled the exchange at the end of "Judgement at Nuremberg". I am penitent about my position on Iraq, not because the cause were wrong or that I am a pacifist, but because Bush and his gang of criminal incompetents were the wrong leaders and managers for this momentous decision.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 9:01pm

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Basman - reading your post on Polonius explained to my why every time I read the Polonius passage, I am reminded of johnson's quip on Chesterfield's letters: "They teach the morals of a whore and the manners of a dancing master." Lovely piece.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 9:05pm

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Molly, two to go.

- icarusr

September 16, 2010 at 9:06pm

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one left, set it up

- miceelf

September 16, 2010 at 9:15pm

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Yesss! I did it! Thank you all for indulging me. I was at my book group and was certain I would miss my chance. See you on the next thread.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 17, 2010 at 12:32am

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Noga: your endorsement of icarus's flatulant rhetorics. I wasn't endorsing anyone's "rhetorics." Would you stop accusing me of stuff I haven't done!!

- ironyroad

September 17, 2010 at 1:51am

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ick: "I do think you are a malicious . . . liar" Don't be ridiculous. You have no evidence whatsoever for that accusation. There's a huge chasm between (a) accusing someone of deliberately misreading one and creating an enemy where none was before (and for my part I always assumed your Hebrew remark was meant in Swiftian satirical sense) and (b) accusing them of lying. There are many things one could say about Noga (I have a list of about 37, ok 38, of which a tendency to focus in like a killer satellite on a five-word remark to the exclusion of the main point of a post is #1) but a "liar" isn't one of them, and has the echo of an accusation that just feels so good in the hand one can't put it back in the garage along with the other tools. Noga is in my experience a painfully truthful person who doesn't take a side-glance at popularity or at the momentarily prevailing fudge/consensus before she says her piece or lays out her position.

- ironyroad

September 17, 2010 at 2:17am

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T'was better left @ 400.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 2:31am

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irony, I guess, but at times (a) can be so apparently consistent and such a tortured rendering in individual cases that (b) doesn't seem like much of a stretch. I agree on the "painfully" part, however. basman, now you have to single handedly move it to 500. Looks like an interesting day ahead of you.

- miceelf

September 17, 2010 at 6:03am

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"SHYLOCK A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel! O wise young judge, how I do honour thee!"

- noga1

September 17, 2010 at 7:03am

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I have to admit that, after having tuned to the thread last eve, it was a bit of a tease.... a lustful eye on 400. Like artistic thread sex complete with anticipation and desire, the denial of satisfactions to increase the climactic. The old "book group trick" does it every time but requires a masterful employer. Hats off to MOLLYSIMON. Kama Sutrex extraordinaire. I can't wait ( but I must) until 500. She's a genius.....

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 7:23am

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Irony: there are many different sorts of lies. There is the lie absolute, " Obama is a Muslim", and I concede that is not what I meant. (JD has been proven a serial liar, in this sense, and I agree that Noga never went that far.) There is the lie relative, and, frankly, "a tendency to focus in like a killer satellite on a five-word remark to the exclusion of the main point of a post" is, in my view, in the ballpark, especially where the main point of a post modifies or contradicts the five-word remark (and that, too, has happened). It is, in that sense that I made the remark. As for your "painfully truthful" observation, remember the timeless oath of the witness, "the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth"? Sometimes, telling only a part of the truth is far more damaging than an outright lie, for the partial truth sanctifies and solidifies, for the truth aspect of it, the mistaken implication. If I said, "Obama cannot produce an original birth-certificate," it would be true, but in context, no less malicious, or "a substantive lie", than saying, "he cannot produce a birth certificate at all".

- icarusr

September 17, 2010 at 7:48am

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Bas the man. Our resident Blues enthusiast and aficionado: Me, ever on the lookout for comprehensive brevity do nominate, "Nobody loves me but my mother. And she could be jivin, too." as the essential blues lyric. As a matter of fact that whole album ,' Indianola Mississippi Seeds ' represented a very nice musical convergence with emerged/ing artists in their own rights. Carole King, Joe Walsh, and Leon Russell. It is a sometimes playful yet ever soulful BB King offering. Now I know, as you tend to appreciation of the raw edge in pursuit of purity, that this particular might not meet your requirements for essence and Essenes sensibility but give it a shot sometime when you're feeling generous.

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 8:19am

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"(I always assumed your Hebrew remark was meant in Swiftian satirical sense)" "CATHERINE Oh, thank you. Will you betray a technical secret, Sir Robert? What happened during the first examination to make you so sure if he is innocent. SIR ROBERT Three things. First of all, he made far too many damaging admissions. A guilty person would have been much more careful and on his guard. Secondly I laid him a trap and thirdly left him a loophole. Anyone who was guilty would have fallen into the one and darted through the other. He did neither. CATHERINE The trap was when you asked him suddenly what time Elliot put the postal order in his locker, wasn't it? SIR ROBERT Yes. CATHERINE And the loophole? SIR ROBERT I then suggested to him that he'd stolen the postal order for a joke which had he been guilty I'm quite sure he would have admitted to as being the lesser of two evils. CATHERINE I see. It was very cleverly thought out. SIR ROBERT Thank you."

- noga1

September 17, 2010 at 8:23am

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Another very honorable mention in the blues lyrics category is " Born under a Bad Sign. I been down since I began to crawl. If it wasn't for bad luck I wouldn't have no luck at all."

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 9:15am

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Since this thread is insisting on being musically-focused, and since this is Yom Kippur eve, I'd like to add my choice for a depressing song for the day ahead: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2T274bXIxU&feature=related

- noga1

September 17, 2010 at 10:53am

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And parenthetically!

- ironyroad

September 17, 2010 at 10:56am

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I don't know malahat. I'm thinking it speaks in that contrast by implication kind of way. Not unlike 'Summertime' . I don't guess Basman will be completely unforgiving. Noga. Ever the stranger even unto self. Yeah... pretty cheery stuff.

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 11:12am

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Noga, Leonard Cohen is making a grand tour through Europe even as we speak. I saw him in Florence on Sept 1st where he played an outdoor concert in front of Santa Croce. Same piazza where I saw Paul Simon and his band twenty years ago during my first visit to Italy. He has new musicians and backup singers now, but they are no less magnificent. And he still sings his marvelous inscrutable verses with the same hypnotic passion. Sonny Rollins' final tkiyah gdolah is so awesome that services tomorrow can only be anti-climatic, but I will go anyway and offer a special prayer in honor of that ancient lineage of Cohens. L'shanah tova

- willjames77

September 17, 2010 at 11:42am

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Basman, I want to congratulate you on running the thread up to 400. Not only are you a gentleman for handing the honor to Molly, but you are a scholar as well--you're piece on Hamlet is exquisite. Thanks for sharing it.

- willjames77

September 17, 2010 at 11:46am

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Jacko, you did what most people can't: You made me laugh out loud at a written joke. My blues education went only up to Muddy Waters and that one song, "I Put a Spell on You," by Screaming Jay Hawkins. But I did get to see Fats Domino and Al Green perform. I know they weren't blues men, but it should give me some cred around here. Though I will probably kill that one count of cred by confessing that the "Born under a bad sign" lyric was originally sung by Cream. Now that's embarrassing. Especially now because I think Eric Clapton is a huge bore.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 17, 2010 at 11:47am

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Here is one of my favourite summrtimes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDLDl0_pt_k

- noga1

September 17, 2010 at 11:48am

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Malahat, thanks for the kind words earlier, but, please, I'm no Basman.

- willjames77

September 17, 2010 at 11:54am

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"And parenthetically!" Indeed. The artfulness of the ironish mind.

- noga1

September 17, 2010 at 11:55am

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Thanks, Malahat. From your pen to God's ears... All the best to you as well.

- willjames77

September 17, 2010 at 12:10pm

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Mollysimon: I can only hope it was as good for you as it was for me.

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 12:17pm

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willjames, Leonard Cohen in " Florence... in front of Santa Croce." sounds like, I don't know, too good to even imagine. G'mar Chatima Tova!

- noga1

September 17, 2010 at 12:22pm

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Here's a picture to help you imagine. One of the interesting things about this medieval church is that the facade wasn't completed until the mid-19th century. The trio of architects included a Jew, hence the interesting design in the apex: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c3/Santa_Croce_Firenze.jpg

- willjames77

September 17, 2010 at 12:36pm

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Molly. I kind of hesitated to mention this as bona fides can be overrated but Born Under a Bad Sign was originally written and recorded by Albert King, written by Booker T. Jones and lyric by William Bell. But then there really isn't any shame in producing Cream/Clapton as a cover version. Not all that bad for a group of white Brits, all considered. Hey I love Janis Joplins version of Summertime..... an all white folks affair. That doesn't detract from authentic connection. At least in the render of such.

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 12:36pm

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That should be ( obviously ) originally recorded by Albert King and written by....

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 12:44pm

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I was there many years ago. My then boyfriend later my husband had gone for some head-cleaning in India and Tibet and I met him in Rome after he had cleaned his head and we traveled around Italy for a few weeks. Florence was of course one of the main reasons for choosing Italy. I'd just graduated from the Hebrew University, with an Art History degree. You can imagine what it was like, to come face to face with what had been just slides and pictures in books!

- noga1

September 17, 2010 at 12:48pm

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willjames -- I saw Leonard Cohen in Asheville, N.C. last November, when he was just finishing up his '09 tour. A few of us had toyed with the idea of catching in him at Madison Square Garden a couple of weeks later instead, but it just seemed too expensive for a night of fun. I would have liked to hear him do "Chelsea Hotel" at a NYC concert, though. This most recent incarnation indeed has some magnificent musicians alongside and LC himself seems vigorous, unbowed, and able to revisit his songs and give them a new life.

- ironyroad

September 17, 2010 at 1:41pm

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Suzanne is perhaps the most profound of his works by my lights.

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 1:58pm

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I'm going to offer the lyrics of Suzanne just because it pleases me. Suzanne takes you down to her place near the river You can hear the boats go by You can spend the night beside her And you know that she's half crazy But that's why you want to be there And she feeds you tea and oranges That come all the way from China And just when you mean to tell her That you have no love to give her Then she gets you on her wavelength And she lets the river answer That you've always been her lover And you want to travel with her And you want to travel blind And you know that she will trust you For you've touched her perfect body with your mind. And Jesus was a sailor When he walked upon the water And he spent a long time watching From his lonely wooden tower And when he knew for certain Only drowning men could see him He said "All men will be sailors then Until the sea shall free them" But he himself was broken Long before the sky would open Forsaken, almost human He sank beneath your wisdom like a stone And you want to travel with him And you want to travel blind And you think maybe you'll trust him For he's touched your perfect body with his mind. Now Suzanne takes your hand And she leads you to the river She is wearing rags and feathers From Salvation Army counters And the sun pours down like honey On our lady of the harbour And she shows you where to look Among the garbage and the flowers There are heroes in the seaweed There are children in the morning They are leaning out for love And they will lean that way forever While Suzanne holds the mirror And you want to travel with her And you want to travel blind And you know that you can trust her For she's touched your perfect body with her mind. Jungians would name Suzanne, ' Anima', as sketched by Sophia. What a gorgeous homage. And so "Inceptions" Cobb might testify.

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 2:36pm

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Jacko: Janis Joplin surpasses all races and genres. Although hilariously when my kids heard the song once, they couldn't believe that someone who sang that "badly" (their word) became famous. I told them that one day they would understand.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 17, 2010 at 3:09pm

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MOLLYSIMON:" Janis Joplin surpasses all races and genres. Although hilariously when my kids heard the song once, they couldn't believe that someone who sang that "badly" (their word) became famous. I told them that one day they would understand." She could flat out bring it, couldn't she? She reached for all that she had. "Piece of My Heart" was a great one, too. And of course, "Me and Bobby McGee." Wonderful stuff.

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 3:52pm

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Thanks for the inclusion, malahat. I'll have a look see. Thanks.

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 3:55pm

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malahat, the Live in London (2008) is wonderful. I've been playing it for around 15 months now and never tire of it. I played it for a friend who had never really heard of Cohen (Ah, youth! She's 37) and she was bowled over by it -- and became very interested in his career. And thus a bunch of academics of various ages toodled over the mountain to Asheville as if they were teenagers heading out for their first folk festival.

- ironyroad

September 17, 2010 at 4:09pm

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malahat: I'll put it this way; BBatHC were perfect and unique for some of what they did. Of course that some of what is what they did best. When it fit it was very right. There were some things which didn't fit, however . Thus the knock. I'm a musician and can tell you in all of my exalted knowing that they were sometimes very yes and sometimes very no. How's that for unequivocal?

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 4:28pm

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Leonard Cohen - another wonderful Canadian export ... Incidentally, has there ever been a better rendition of a Cohen song by someone other than Cohen, than k.d. lang's Halleluja? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVq0L4kkpKM Sublime. Between him, her and the divine Miss M. (Sarah McLachlan), they made the Olympics opening ceremonies the most memorable for me.

- icarusr

September 17, 2010 at 4:40pm

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Famous Blue Raincoat: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aRKZFR5imM It's four in the morning, the end of December I'm writing you now just to see if you're better New York is cold, but I like where I'm living There's music on Clinton Street all through the evening. I hear that you're building your little house deep in the desert You're living for nothing now, I hope you're keeping some kind of record. Yes, and Jane came by with a lock of your hair She said that you gave it to her That night that you planned to go clear Did you ever go clear? Ah, the last time we saw you you looked so much older Your famous blue raincoat was torn at the shoulder You'd been to the station to meet every train And you came home without Lili Marlene And you treated my woman to a flake of your life And when she came back she was nobody's wife. Well I see you there with the rose in your teeth One more thin gypsy thief Well I see Jane's awake -- She sends her regards. And what can I tell you my brother, my killer What can I possibly say? I guess that I miss you, I guess I forgive you I'm glad you stood in my way. If you ever come by here, for Jane or for me Your enemy is sleeping, and his woman is free. Yes, and thanks, for the trouble you took from her eyes I thought it was there for good so I never tried. And Jane came by with a lock of your hair She said that you gave it to her That night that you planned to go clear -- Sincerely, L. Cohen

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 4:55pm

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I can't believe I'm saying this: 49 to go! Excuse me I have to jump out my window: and I'm in basement.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 4:56pm

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Nice cover, maybe a mite precious: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1vb3ujbl0g&feature=related

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 5:03pm

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Not so great: can't find a good middle between the jazzy sax filigreeing and the plainness and inexpressive of her singing, imho: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPlpxHhzSp0&feature=related

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 5:07pm

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Tough song: I have mixed feelings about Joan Baez: way too over sung here imho, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5uCE8wTlRs&feature=related

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 5:13pm

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Starts so beautifully, but then kind of trails off and loses the impact of the lyric. No? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Av0ua3XyzI8&feature=related What a tough song to cover just right!

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 5:18pm

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Okay here's the cover that works for my money: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKIX7xyAN6M&feature=related

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 5:26pm

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Retract that: it ends badly and goes on too long. The search continues.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 5:31pm

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Another song just nailed by original artist that I've never heard satisfactorily covered: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5Rjo_imHDE&feature=related

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 5:39pm

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Thanks for the Rain, Itz. I've never heard that before. Hey, it's either your son or son in law has some decent chops. Thanks for that, too. Jack

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 5:50pm

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And another chestnut, that it be: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xzDhLvhgQw Fantastic song especially "I know, I know, I know, I Know, I know, and on and on" and "leave young thing alone" My, my.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 5:57pm

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Better than the cover, love the inadvertant bits of scratches, reminds me of listening to this in my bedroom on my farkakteh little record player in my teens. Saw him at U.B.C. doing this live, one blind guy playing amazing guitar singing with Hispanic inflected passion, holding hundreds of kids absolutely rapt. Blows The Doors away, I think: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjc-kKBq9_Q&feature=related

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 6:02pm

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C'est ca pour moi.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 6:02pm

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Not yet: Ken Basman is my nephew, I'm presuming you mean him, Jack. And a compliment coming from you who actually knows what he's talking about in these areas, being a musician, is high praise indeed.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 6:05pm

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Also never heard any cover matching this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQU4torUz-Q I heard Otis Redding's version and a few others, but Sam Cooke, as they say, just totally nails this. Beautiful. At my daughter's wedding I argued for this as the wedding march music and got rightly out voted but they chose You Send Me by S. C. and it worked great. By the way I gave a great speech at that wedding and got it uploaded somewhere. If anyone wants to hear it lemme know, I'd be happy to give the link.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 6:11pm

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Right you are Malahat on Grandma's Hands.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 6:17pm

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Someone before mentioned Janis Joplin. Oy vey don't get me started. Ball and Chain//Little Girl Blue/others: genius I tell you genius.

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 6:19pm

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for a little change up: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPBqk-0gWfQ&NR=1

- jacko

September 17, 2010 at 6:22pm

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wedding speech: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1572659516109693181#

- basman

September 17, 2010 at 6:22pm

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Ah! The one great song missing from the Live in London CD!

- ironyroad

September 17, 2010 at 6:56pm

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Something weird has happened, I'm seeing a red bold font, and basman's "Famous Blue Raincoat" has disappeared, hence making my last comment meaningless.

- ironyroad

September 17, 2010 at 6:58pm

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Oh ok -- that's on the previous page. Phew!

- ironyroad

September 17, 2010 at 7:00pm

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This British blogger, Bob from Brockley, put together "some versions of "Kol Nidre", and other Yom Kippur music." http://brockley.blogspot.com/2010/09/mans-origin-is-from-dust-and-his.html

- noga1

September 17, 2010 at 7:56pm

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Jennifer Warnes - and I can't see how you ever thought Tori Amos was good for your money ... oh, yeah, youtube - you didn't pay anything .... And thanks for Sam Cooke - awesome. Incidentally, Mohammad Nouri, one of Iran's pioneers of Jazz, died two weeks ago at 84 (I think). One of his most beautiful songs was based on a Nat King Cole melody. The lyrics were by Forough Farokhzad, the most famous woman poet and one of the most admired poets of modern Persian in the past fifty years. RIP. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7GXvP5Vyho

Silence of the shore - In the silence of the shore , Dishevelled, the night strolls along in the silence of the shore Beating, the heart inside cries youll be here, youll be here Like flowers youll scatter the scent of joy Your eyes shining, o what beauty, o what beauty Those secret covering curtains of your eyes will open in a shy blink And Ill sing of my sorrows in your ears. In the silence of the shore, Im all alone Slumbering in the arms of dreams, o what dreams, o what dreams ...

- icarusr

September 17, 2010 at 9:34pm

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Better version of hound dog Elvis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQyHYGUJnuc&feature=related or Big Mama Thornton: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XUAg1_A7IE I swing back and forth on this pressing ?.

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 1:21am

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I have to agree with icarusr that Tori Amos doesn't touch Jennifer Warnes' cover of Raincoat. It's intriguing at the start but somehow she dissipates all the dramatic interest before very long into the song.

- willjames77

September 18, 2010 at 2:38am

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Barry Rubin's Jewish introspection: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/the-death-wish-of-the-jewish-intellectual-left/ "There is also something very sinister behind these cliches despite their surface nobility: the substitution of oneself for others. For if one is going to “proclaim” oneself to be of these groups then one is also defining them, telling them how they ought to think and behave, thus taking away their freedom to do so themselves. And who but a left-wing and particularly Jewish intellectual would have the nerve to say in 1948, forgetting his own responsibility for the events he is discussing: I saw peace-lovers make the same mistake with Hitler that you are now making with Stalin, to hush 6,000,000 cremated Jews, a spread of war made inevitable instead of conceivably avoidable. So just who was it that made such a mistake in 1939? Answer: Those like Wolfe on the Communist left (as well as the extreme right) who warned — in contrast to most democratic socialists, liberals, and conservatives — that anything was better than opposing Germany’s ambitions and system. We’re working today to ensure that the political heirs of such thinking don’t get the chance a decade from today to ridicule — without admitting it was their fault — mistakes that cost millions of lives and added to the misery of even more."

- noga1

September 18, 2010 at 9:42am

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Noga, thanks for the Kol Nidre links. I just listened to the Moishe Oysher version during the afternoon break, and the poignant melodrama swept me away. These black sheep who return to the fold--who can sing with more passionate conviction? (he asks, drying his eyes...)

- willjames77

September 18, 2010 at 10:38am

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" These black sheep who return to the fold-" I'm thinking Benny Morris and maybe just maybe Christopher Hitchens? If there is an "early" someone and a "later", who prevails? The irresistible romance of the prodigal son, that ignores the fact that the son who had left is not the son who returned, and the fold that had been left behind is never quite the same fold he returns to. It's a negotiated distance. Don't you think? "There is a story in the Talmud about a king who had a son who went astray. The son was told, 'Return to your father.' The son replied that he could not. The king then sent a messenger to the son with the message... 'Come back to me as far as you can, and I will meet you the rest of the way. "

- noga1

September 18, 2010 at 11:36am

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WHAT'S WITH THE RED TYPE?

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 11:41am

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More seriously who is the biggest party animal in all of English letters?

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 11:55am

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Oscar Wilde!

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 11:56am

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The worst lover?

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 11:56am

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Jonathon Swift.

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 11:57am

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According to some Chinese speakers the least desirable to have in one's kitchen?

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 11:57am

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Jennifer Warnes: those are some mighty voices in her favour. But can't see it. Taking a personal poll around here.

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 12:02pm

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Kinkiest lover might be Philip Roth.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 18, 2010 at 3:13pm

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Most "prolific" modern writer might be Philip Roth, who at one time kept a stack of his novels at the door, to hand to whichever groupie he'd bedded the night before. Nora Ephron barely concealed his identity when she wrote of her own tryst with Roth.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 18, 2010 at 3:15pm

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I suspect that Benny Morris realized at some point that all his efforts to provide a more nuanced, balanced narrative just provided free raw material to those who specialize in anti-Zionist polemics. When I come across his essays and articles these days, he always seems intent on countering anti-Israel bias in media coverage. Is Christopher Hitchens Jewish? Never heard this before. I've wondered how he is able to write so astutely about Islamofascism and numerous other topics, but when he turns to Israel he always seems mired in a crippling even-handedness that constrains him to express equal disdain for both camps. Perhaps it's an over-compensation. Barry Rubin, on the other hand, never insults or overplays his hand, but always tells it like it is. Wish he could clone himself ten-fold.

- willjames77

September 18, 2010 at 3:29pm

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"Biggest party animal in English letters"? Probably Lord Byron whose Childe Harold alter-ego caroused throughout Europe until "he felt the fullness of satiety". If we stretch the category of "English letters" just a bit, then honorable consideration would also be due to Frank Harris, whose 2000 page erotic memoir was described by his biographer, Steven Marcus, as "a tour of 19th century Europe seen through the eye of a penis". Basman, why do I suspect that your latest round of questions are driven by a certain milestone goal that you cherish?

- willjames77

September 18, 2010 at 3:52pm

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"Is Christopher Hitchens Jewish? Never heard this before." The way in which he discovered his origins reads like some cliche plot device in a second-rate novel: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Hitchens#Early_life

- noga1

September 18, 2010 at 4:08pm

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I suspect that Basman's latest round of questions is driven by the lightness of head that occurs after one has imbibed one too many.

- noga1

September 18, 2010 at 4:11pm

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icarusr, the song by Mohammad Nouri was a bit too sentimental for my jaded palette, but the singing was lovely. First time I've had a chance to hear Farsi sung, through I've often heard it spoken - my favorite coffee shop in California is run by a family from Isfahan. Tell me I'm wrong, but is Nouri actually playing a Hawaiian peddle-steel guitar? Has the country-western sound spread that far around the world? (Time to stop posting awhile before I accidentally cross the magic threshold.)

- willjames77

September 18, 2010 at 4:14pm

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Here we are rolling up on 5 with no pressure and easy as you please. What a difference a day makes.

- jacko

September 18, 2010 at 4:17pm

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A couple of years some bloggers participated in a meme game in which they were to provide the seven songs that made their spring happy. I tagged an Iranian blogger (Selma) and here are her choices, which, if you open the link, you will see have some pertinence to what has been happening in this thread more recently:) http://antiutopia.wordpress.com/2008/05/17/my-spring-sappiness/

- noga1

September 18, 2010 at 4:23pm

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Oops.

- noga1

September 18, 2010 at 4:36pm

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Well, we can always carry on to 600.

- noga1

September 18, 2010 at 5:03pm

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NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 5:06pm

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Cover versions (alphabetically) "Famous Blue Raincoat" has also been recorded by numerous other artists, including: * AaRON on album Artificial Animals Riding On Neverland (2007) * Tori Amos on tribute album Tower of Song (1995) * Joan Baez on live album Diamonds & Rust in the Bullring (1989) * John Bergeron on tribute album In the House of Mystery (2002) * Kari Bremnes on tribute album Hadde månen en søster: Cohen på norsk (1993), as "Gikk du noen gang fri?" * Katie Buckhaven on the 2005 album Katie Buckhaven. * Lloyd Cole on compilation album Rare on Air, Vol. 2 (1995) * Jared Louche (lead singer of Chemlab) on his 1999 solo album Covergirl.[2] * Judy Collins on live album Living (1971) and on tribute album Judy Collins Sings Leonard Cohen: Democracy (2004) * Jonathan Coulton on his album Thing a Week Three (2006) * Luce Dufault on album Soir de première (2000) * Angel Falls (live) * Karen Jo Fields on album In Your Pages (2005) * FourPlay Electric String Quartet on album Fourthcoming (2009) * The Handsome Family on Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man (OST), (2006) * Hayden (Paul Hayden Desser), live with only piano accompaniment since at least 1996. * Steve Hogarth (live) * Andrew John on album The Machine Stops (1972) * Jorcx on album "Jorcx Interpreta Cohen" (2006, sung in Catalan) * Matej Krajnc on album Likvidamber (2004) (Slovenian) * Swan Lee (Danish cover) on tribute album På danske læber, as Din gamle blå frakke * Sharon Lifshitz (Hebrew cover; Lyrics by Tzruya Lahav) on album "Kav HaOsher" (1993) * The Like (live on Indie 103.1 FM, B-side of "June Gloom" single) * Jared Louche and the Aliens on album Covergirl * Laurie MacAllister on album The Things I Choose to Do (2005) * Tom Mega on album Songs & Prayers (1995) * Marissa Nadler on album Songs III: Bird on the Water (2007) * Dax Riggs (live) * Roman Roczen (polish cover) * Damien Saez on live album God Blesse (2002) * Richard Shindell on live album Live at The Chandler Music Hall Randolph, Vermont: Archive Series #1 (2008) * Beth Sorrentino on album Nine Songs, One Story (2006) * Jennifer Warnes on tribute album Famous Blue Raincoat (1987) * Vassilikos on album vintage (2009)

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 6:16pm

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WillJ: I think it is a "se-tar" in the background - a string instrument ("tar") with three ("se") strings, but am not sure. Country never made it to Iran, except when an Iranian singer, trying to establish her international credentials, sang "Jolene." Not a happy experience. Admittedly, the song is, in itself and especially in translation (not mine, by the way), somewhat syrupy. A bit of context might help, though. Forough was killed in a car accident in her early thirties. She is the one who wrote the poem, "The wind will take us", that became the movie, plus a whole lot of other poems with themes of longing and abandonment, largely out of her own life. She was extraordinarily beautiful; writing in the early 60s, she broke every taboo; after her death, she was never replaced, and then the Revolution made sure that she would never be replaced or equalled. (She was the product of a particular moment in Iran's history ... gone forever.) The lyrics to this song are about the only thing from her that, though touched by loneliness, have any sweetness untempered by the bitterness of loss. Plus, of course, Mohammad Nouri had a magnificent voice.

- icarusr

September 18, 2010 at 6:26pm

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My feelings about Joan Baez are colored by a friend's husband's experiences. Apparently, when he was growing up, his valium-addicted mother played Joan incessantly. So his way of coping is to make fun of her. When voice goes into one of her trills, he laughs his ass off. He thinks she's nothing but a show off. And now he's ruined her for me. Though I still like "I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night." Simply because the title is so, well, dreamy.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 18, 2010 at 6:28pm

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The Joan Baez version was uniquely unappetizing - and I really like her. I wonder how k. d. lang would have done it. No doubt magnificently.

- icarusr

September 18, 2010 at 6:29pm

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Joan Baez singing "The Rose" in German; how to ruin a perfectly good song. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Np6L0znQO2U&feature=related There ought to be a law limiting singing in German to Schubert, Strauss and Beethoven. And banning anglophone folk singer from ever going near the language.

- icarusr

September 18, 2010 at 6:35pm

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Yes, but I like the way Brenda Lee sings "Danke Schoen"--although in fairness the only thing German about that song is the title.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 18, 2010 at 6:43pm

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I don't think that counts, otherwise we would have to outlaw "Goodbye, Farewell" from "The Sound of Music" ... Noticed Joan Baez also did "Cry me a river" - passable - which took me to the teasing Dinah Washington version: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipc1DWfJhg4&feature=fvw Which then took me to the Shirley Bassey version: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6f4hFB5R4aM Good old Shirley, who normally caramelises anything she sings (well, other than Bond songs, but that is a different story), manages to bring real pathos and pain into this one. i think she owns this one.

- icarusr

September 18, 2010 at 6:51pm

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icarusr, Thanks for explaining some of the sentiment that Forough's song carries for you. It made me think of a comment that Edgar Allan Poe once made, that the untimely death of a beautiful young woman is the ultimate poetic theme. The notion of an Iranian singer performing "Jolene" caught me by surprise and actually made me laugh out loud. K.D. Laing's version of "Hallelujah" was a worthy cover, but I don't find that her voice has the emotional range of LC's. Halleluyah is such a strange, powerful song with its heady mix of sacred and profane images. LC offers it up as the ragged beast that he is, climbing the altar to sing a song of praise. I can't imagine anyone else pulling it off in the magnificent way that he does.

- willjames77

September 18, 2010 at 7:10pm

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I agree, not in the same way. But then, the experiences are different enough that, at least in my view, each can be appreciated in itself and by itself in a separate category of song. I think the best illustration of that is Johhny Cash's performance of "Hurt", which is originally a Nine Inch Tails song. By the time he sang this one, Cash had lost much of his voice, but none of the raw emotion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o22eIJDtKho Here is the piano version of the original: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cefrrdRUid4 "What have I become" is the same line; "everyone I know goes away" are the same words. And yet, from each, it means a different thing. That pretty much is how I relate to an LC song, and a cover: the original is an experience unto itself, not to be compared to any other; every other performance may then be assessed on its own merits.

- icarusr

September 18, 2010 at 7:38pm

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Malahat ... thanks a lot. I know we have had our disagreements in the past, but I never thought you would stoop to a Cheney-esque retort. Now and forever I will have "See Lip Dick" in my head every time I see Paul McCartney. The horror, the horror ...

- icarusr

September 18, 2010 at 7:45pm

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Actually to get back to Cohen, I had about 13 people over here breaking the fast and we got to arguing about the words of The Famous Blue Rain Coat. Cohen I say is a poet therefore I say every word in that song, a species of poetry, has to carry some meaning that integrates into a whole system of meaning that makes integrated sense of the lyric. I can't makes that out with it and Cohen himself says he didn't "nail' the lyric and is not entirely happy with it. For example is Joan still living with "L. Cohen" or does she just sleep over on occasion and why the formal closing--"Sincerely L. Cohen--for his "brother" his "killer", who he guesses he misses and forgives? I find the poetry of the song awash in ambiguities that I can't work out. Does any one know of an explication or intrepretation of it they can recommend?

- basman

September 18, 2010 at 9:43pm

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"I find the poetry of the song awash in ambiguities that I can't work out." Er, isn't that the whole point of any poetry?

- icarusr

September 19, 2010 at 12:00am

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Sometimes I think Bruce Springsteen's lyrics sound like poetry.

- MOLLYSIMON

September 19, 2010 at 12:32am

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...Er, isn't that the whole point of any poetry... Er, no. Paradox is an ambiguity that is comprehensible. That's the essence of tension in literature, the essence of literary meaning. One doesn't resolve the tension, this kind of controlled ambiguity but one understands the terms of reference, the contours, if you will, of the ambiguity. But when meanings defy any putting together, when they make no sense, when things are unintentionally absurd, they make the literary art fail. So not for nothing did Cohen himself say about this song: "The problem with that song is that I've forgotten the actual triangle. Whether it was my own - of course, I always felt that there was an invisible male seducing the woman I was with, now whether this one was incarnate or merely imaginary I don't remember, I've always had the sense that either I've been that figure in relation to another couple or there'd been a figure like that in relation to my marriage. I don't quite remember but I did have this feeling that there was always a third party, sometimes me, sometimes another man, sometimes another woman. It was a song I've never been satisfied with. It's not that I've resisted an impressionistic approach to songwriting, but I've never felt that this one, that I really nailed the lyric. I'm ready to concede something to the mystery, but secretly I've always felt that there was something about the song that was unclear. So I've been very happy with some of the imagery, but a lot of the imagery... The tune I think is good, I remember my mother approving of it, I remember playing the tune for her, in her kitchen, and her perking up her ears while she was doing something else and saying "that's a nice tune". From Christopher Herold's impossibly silly essay on this song, online here: http://www.heroldmusic.com/html/famous_blue_raincoat_english.htm Willjames7: now that (non drinking related) sobriety is attending me after the nuttiness of extending this thread, I have begun reading Lecture the 2nd by Kermode. After struggling through the first, I'm finding it still irritatingly obscure and the parts I think I understand quite wrong headed. Take this for example (from an argument that seeks to assimilate a/the theory of literary fictions to a/the theory of fiction itself) ...If King Lear is an image of the promised end, so is Buchenwald; and they both stand under the accusation of being horrible rootless fantasies, the one no more true or more false than the other, so that the best you can say is that King Lear does less harm.... It'll take me a while to get through it and when I do, I'll let you know. Maybe we can talk about it a little. I hope by then the tourists will let you be, however it is that they don't.

- basman

September 19, 2010 at 2:28am

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p.s. Who is the greatest finisher in English literature?

- basman

September 19, 2010 at 2:30am

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John Donne.

- basman

September 19, 2010 at 2:30am

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Ostensibly our poetics attempt to reveal a place , an existential truth, a dimension beyond words. That mystery prevails even unto the author one might entertain that perhaps the personal shadow is struggling to be revealed. The unavoidable projector of conscious content and the sensibility of its proposition necessarily depends upon this fullness and comprehension of that very shadow that is most often only apprehended according to the strength of the light we are standing in. Music to stroke the chin by. And his brother is thus and so.

- jacko

September 19, 2010 at 7:45am

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A very talented poet once described his role as someone who went over the edge and came back with a report. I thought it was a brilliant way of illustrating the poetic mind. Perhaps all madmen are poets but poets are those select, special coterie of madmen in whom the line that demarcates sanity from madness keeps shifting. Poets are always chasing after that line trying to grab it, still it and tame it for a second. Their poems are the written testimonies of those moments. In that respect I more or less agree with jacko that "our poetics attempt to reveal a place , an existential truth, a dimension beyond words." I say "more or less' because I'm not sure about the last one "a dimension beyond words." I think the poet, the genuine one at least, tries to restore primeval meanings to words. He skirts very closely to the beginnings of things, discards the patina to reveal the intense colours of the intelligent emotion. Any which way you describe poetics is bound to reduce it. Which is what differentiates us mere mortals from the true poets who manage activate language in the opposite direction: an intensification of words.

- noga1

September 19, 2010 at 8:13am

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Hi, Noga. Good thoughts. I'm going to be really busy for the next while and won't be able to participate as I would like. I'm going to have to leave it at this... though it will inevitably be insufficient. This very insufficiency tends to ratify my proposition, 'beyond'. Any constructions must ultimately stand before 'awe' for their own validity to be established. The marriage of forward moving time and ' ever thus'. It is funny that you and I have been pursuing this common thread even amongst the unavoidable noise being generated. But I have to check out for about a week or so. Perhaps we'll be knocking upon a thousand comments by then. Anyway... Be well and hope to see y'all late next week. Jack

- jacko

September 19, 2010 at 8:49am

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Adieu Jacques. http://public-domain.zorger.com/samantha-at-the-worlds-fair/farewell-have-a-nice-trip-woman-waving-handkerchief-goodbye-dont-forget-to-write-pen-ink-drawing.png

- noga1

September 19, 2010 at 8:59am

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Basman: "But when meanings defy any putting together, when they make no sense, when things are unintentionally absurd, they make the literary art fail." I was referring to "ambiguities"; you are referring to absurdities and lack of meaning altogether. Perhaps I was taking you too literally. The poetry of Hafez - I can only talk about what I know, which is Persian poetry, I am afraid - is "ambiguous" in the sense that it leaves you uncertain of the exact direction - Sufism, Islamic mysticism, or drunken whore-mongering? - and struggling for meaning, and each reading brings you closer only to confusion and uncertainty. Much of modern Persian poetry, however, in seeking poetic ambiguity, only finds arhythmic absurdity: incomprehensible prose lined up vertically, as if in Japanese, and more or less as comprehensible to a Persian-speaker. Ambiguity of the first kind is the poetic form - almost a necessary condition for the sublime, I would argue; "ambiguity" of the second kind, and of the kind that you meant, is just gibberish, IMHO.

- icarusr

September 19, 2010 at 10:12am

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A-propo John Donne, I don't know if he is the greatest finisher but he does have a way with beginnings: "BATTER my heart, three person'd God... " Or "“For God’s Sake Hold your Tongue and Let me Love”

- noga1

September 19, 2010 at 11:09am

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It's jokes: finisher/Donne---party animal/wilde--terrible lover//swift--Klutz in the kitchen according to some Chinese speakers// And so on!

- basman

September 19, 2010 at 11:15am

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Ah. John is done. Sorry. Still, something about finishing there. Not that I would know about such things.

- noga1

September 19, 2010 at 11:27am

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Interestingly "basman" in Persian would roughly translate to "I'm done". bas = enough; man = I/me. What's more, it's true.

- icarusr

September 19, 2010 at 11:51am

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"basman" in Hebrew would translate roughly into something like the perfume expert.

- noga1

September 19, 2010 at 12:04pm

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Jacko, you say “ostensibly”, which means “so it would seem” and immediately carries the implication of what so seems may not be so. So do I take you not to be committed to ostensible proposition? And I'm not what you mean by “existential truth” though I think I have a sense of it. Existential is used so often in so many contexts that that multitude of usage inclines to empty the word of content. People might say country x faces an existential dilemma, which suggests to me a national life or death crisis. Or people talk about existential as a pure realm of being the way Mailer talked about orgasm as a pure existential experience in time. Or people people posit our lonely, autonomous existences and say each person must determine his or her own meaning by an act combining consciousness and will in a project to (re) make one’s self, providing an essence to our existence. In all of that, and other meaning too perhaps, I sense what you mean by “existential truth” as poetry’s revelation arouses in us, in ways peculiar to contolled, charged language, the experience of artand beauty themselves, finally beyond words, be that described as awe or wonder or deep feelings or “ah ha” or however that may be described. Because that experience is by its nature non verbal, it can’t be articulated in a way that does justice to its intensity for us, we somtimes use the metaphor of mystery to describe it. That's my sense anyway of what you mean. I’m only guessing at what the balance of your post means. But if it means, as I would argue is so, that we need to earn that ineffable experience by—as a necessary condition for it—understanding the meaning of the poem’s words, imagery, metaphors, its building of meaning as it progresses, then I’d agree. In this, poetry is different from the non verbal arts since it’s made up of artfully put together, iintensely charged words. I have a theory about this—that a poem is a progression of awareness that cumulatively builds its meaning out of its properties as it goes along till it winds up as something integrated and whole, with every word, phrase image, metaphor having meaning in complex relation to the whole. Only by some understanding of the whole do we earn, get some purchase on, if you will, our ineffable experience of the poem beyond words.

- basman

September 19, 2010 at 12:35pm

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In other words, jacko, so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens.

- basman

September 19, 2010 at 1:20pm

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Basman, the conclusion of Herold's reading of "Raincoat" is as follows: "At the end of an analysis like this one, there is always the question, whether the gain in information was worth the effort that went into it, and whether disecting a song, especially a song, does not diminish its aura. As a singer I have been singingFamous Blue Raincoat for year, but nevertheless as the analysis progressed, I was increasingly amazed at how much there was I had not noticed all this time. and listening to it now, I do it with an increased awareness of the of the interplay of so many different elements, whose interaction make songs, especially songs as elaborately constructed as Cohen's songs, such an unique art form." That doesn't seem so 'impossibly silly" to me.

- ironyroad

September 19, 2010 at 5:55pm

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Basman, I very much appreciated your image of the poem cumulatively building a relation between all of its elements. To which I would add only that poems written within a tradition can add additional dimensions to their depth and complexity by skillfully referencing and invoking various elements and contexts which the tradition offers. The loss of continuity with earlier traditions has closed largely these doors, and the emphasis has shifted to originality of vision. "Wow, no one ever said or did that before!" That loss, and the ignorance of what was lost, is what I think T.S. Eliot had in mind when he said "Radical originality is the hallmark of a second-rate mind." As for your name, when I had a quick look at your wedding speech post, I was surprised at how tall you were. One of the strangest aspects of virtual relationships is that people never look the way you imagine them. I will now think of you more as Altman than Basman. I'll look forward to your forthcoming Kermode comments. In the meantime, I'll keep nibbling away at the chapters as life and time permit.

- willjames77

September 20, 2010 at 1:27pm

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Thanks malahat: it was a real high point for me. One last comment on The Famous Blue Raincoat. I've unlocked it's mystery: it all comes down to one word in answer to why is the blue rain coat famous. It all comes down to one word: DANDRUFF. Consider the textual evidence: "... and Jane came by with a lock of your hair She said you gave it to her That night you planned to go clear... (i.e. no dandruff) And you treated my woman to a *flake* of your life.." Clearly, any number of years of higher education in Englsih Literature have not gone to waste.

- basman

September 20, 2010 at 9:23pm

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I'll never hear the song in the same way again!

- ironyroad

September 21, 2010 at 12:54am

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Ditto. Several decades ago one of my friends and I used to listen to a few of Om Kalsoum's albums that were in his collection--without understanding a word of Arabic. One night, in a giddy mood, we transliterated the Arabic into the nearest English equivalents. We came up with some hilarious gibberish like "Send on the balcony, Chevy, Chevy, he ate the BB". It was great fun. But, alas, we were never able to listen to that album again.

- willjames77

September 21, 2010 at 11:31am

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WIILAMES, who here would have any idea who "Om Kalsoum" is? "Umm Kulthum is widely regarded as the greatest female singer in Arab music history." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umm_Kulthum I remember that Israeli Jews of Arab lands regarded her as a deity. Such was the veneration she commanded. It was possible to see her on Arab TV stations from Jordan and Egypt. But I could never listen to her sing. Her songs would last 40 minutes, tear-soaked, lamenting, repetitive tunes. Here is an example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjfH8a8wDOU&feature=related

- noga1

September 21, 2010 at 1:00pm

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All right. This is by way of countering that lamentation in the previous comment. Also about love and heartache but what a difference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ai7IsavSldo&feature=related UNA PENA DE AMOR UNA TRIZTEZA LLEVA EL SANTO MANUEL EN SU AMARGURA PASA LA NOCHE CANSADO MOLIENDO CAFE

- noga1

September 21, 2010 at 1:15pm

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Okay, if I had to choose, Leon is an absolutely amazing guitarist and the piece is dazzling. But... Although Om Kalsoum's kind of stylized lamentation is probably not to most people's taste any more, she also has her place in the universe. It's been years since I listened to her, but I remember enjoying her passionate but restrained voice and the lush melodramatic orchestrations. Through her mournful love songs, I think she became very much of an anima figure in the Arab imagination, an embodiment of the idealized feminine. Back in the days before the misogynists with their burka fantasies became all the rage...

- willjames77

September 21, 2010 at 5:50pm

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Om Kalsoum, to her credit, made Arabic "sing" in a way that few singers, artists, and speakers of it have managed to do. But then, I also like Fado ... something about "lachrymose pathos" in both Om Kalsoum and Amelia Rodriguez that I find utterly enchanting. Amelia's niece is trying to replace her, and to modernize Fado - and as long as she lays off singing in English, she (Dulce Puntes) could, I think, pull it off. Om Kalsoum has not had a replacement, by a niece or otherwise ... and probably a good thing too.

- icarusr

September 22, 2010 at 11:25am

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Basman:"I have a theory about this—that a poem is a progression of awareness that cumulatively builds its meaning out of its properties as it goes along till it winds up as something integrated and whole, with every word, phrase image, metaphor having meaning in complex relation to the whole. Only by some understanding of the whole do we earn, get some purchase on, if you will, our ineffable experience of the poem beyond words." Jacko: That was quite well put.

- jacko

September 24, 2010 at 9:52am

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