Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Groundhog Day +1, 2010--updates and the usual rants

IN MEMORIAM HOWARD ZINN Z"L
Howard Zinn died this week and will be sorely missed.He is mourned by many of us. The Jewish Voice for Peace wrote:
Our beloved Howard Zinn died yesterday of a heart attack in Los
Angeles; he was 87. What a huge loss for us as Jews, as
progressives, as human beings who care deeply about the world
and the people in it.
As Zinn wrote in his autobiography, "You Can't Be Neutral on a
Moving Train" (1994), "From the start, my teaching was infused
with my own history. I would try to be fair to other points of
view, but I wanted more than 'objectivity'; I wanted students
to leave my classes not just better informed, but more prepared
to relinquish the safety of silence, more prepared to speak up,
to act against injustice wherever they saw it."
Howard Zinn was a supporter of the peace movement in Israel and
we shall miss him. Here is an interview with him on
refusal
Amnesty International also has 
memories of him.

J.D. Salinger also died this week. I was already out of adolescence
when Catcher in the Rye came along so it was really not a bit
deal for me. Some people have comments--although I admired the writing I agree that his
short stories as in The NewYorker were better than the magnum
opus. The thought that he may have indirectly inspired the 
assassination of John Lennon is quite bitter.
The NYTimes has an obituary
R.I.P.
Cultural and Scientific Notes
Darwin A movie I intend to see.

This is an interesting article on the complexities of
 evaluating climate change.  The core conclusions are unchanged
 but the devil as usual is in the   details 
 The chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
 gives an interesting interview at home in India

We heard Lang Lang recently in Tel Aviv and he is indeed the
greatest. I just heard over KUSC that he has moved from
Deutsche Gramophone to SONY records in order to capitalize on
the greater options in the area of video etc. He is indeed more
famous than the Beatles.  Yosefa's granddaughter Ella who is an
expert on Beatle lore told us that the Beatles claimed to be more
famous than Jesus Christ, which puts Lang Lang on a special level....

We are regaled in Israel with stories of wonderful rockets that
can shoot down rockets. Most of it is bullshit designed to
funnel money into the defense establishment. It appears that
the US has problems with its missile defense system as well
and it should give us all pause to think that perhaps military
hardware is not going to solve our problems with security etc.

Avaaz is circulating a petition to get internet and computer
companies to line up with Google in fighting cybercensorship in
China and elsewhere. Please 
click and sign

Gene Weingarten again visits customer service in
Below the Beltway

Gripes and Rants

Benvenuto in Israel Signor Berlusconi! 
The great man is
visiting Israel and blathering nonsense about Israel someday
becoming part of the European Union
Can you imagine Israel living up to EU human rights standards?
In Israel one cannot marry freely--people of different
religions cannot marry legally and have to go abroad. This
leads to a thriving business in Cyprus of Israeli marriage
tourists. There are people who cannot marry at all in Israel
such as a woman thrice widowed (considered literally femme
fatale or isha katlanit in Hebrew) or the offspring of an "illicit"
relationship or a "priest" and a divorced or widowed woman
unless her late husband was also a "priest" in a nonexistent
temple that someday, our orthodox brothers believe, will be rebuilt
and animal sacrifices will again be offered. A minor detail such as status
of minorities would not be relevant to Signor Berlusconi in
light of how the  Roma are treated in Italy. He did, however,
have a few cogent comments on settlement policy etc.

Dissident writer Pham Thanh Nghien
has been jailed for four years in Vietnam after being found
guilty of "spreading propaganda against the state."  Her "crime"
was just telling things as they are.  Below we will see how Israel
is marching towards criminalization of dissent.

Judith Harel provides the OCHA report for the last week

Carlo Stenger has a very good point that applies to all of us
who try to live in Israel as decent people. Unfortunately, he
does not have any good answers, but then no one
has.
The Knesset (Parliament) is now considering a draconian law
that would make it nearly impossible for refugees from deadly
places such as Darfour to obtain asylum here.
Hebrew comment
Amnesty International on asylum law

The Knesset is also starting a McCarthy like campaign against
human rights organizations. There a smear campaign
going on against the New Israel Fund and all human rights
organizations in Israel are in danger. Please help out with a
letter to the 
Prime Minister

There are 700 people awaiting execution in California. That is
an incredible number
It would save the state a bundle to put them on life with or
without parole and let them work and pay restitution. Killing a
murderer is still murder. I append an Amnesty International
document on capital punishment as of
2007.  Criminologists agree that there is no real
deterrent value and the issue is vengeance, which should
not be a function of the State.  Amnesty on capital punishment

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Update for January 27, 2010--musings and rants

IN MEMORIAM PROF. AVRAHAM MALAMAT 1922-2010
When I first came to Israel in 1949 as a young student, one of
the first people to befriend me was a young instructor in
Jewish history at the Hebrew University, Dr. Avraham Malamat.
Over the years, he because a major worldwide authority on
Ancient Near East and Biblical History. He died last
week at age 87 leaving a great scholarly legacy .
It is typical of his modesty that I could not find a picture of
him on the Web. May his memory be a blessing.

WEATHER
This has been a very rainy week as was the week before.  Dry wadis
have flooded and even some lives lost including daredevils who make a
sport of jumping into swollen streams.  Thei is what the Revivim stream looked
like a few days ago as shown on the Israel Meteorological Service Web site.

This is normally dry desert.  I hope I am not infringing on someone's copyright by showing this shot.

Before I start this week's rants, let me deal with some pleasant and, I hope, interesting things. You will note that I did not use the adverb" hopefully," as is too often used in such a context.  The late William Safire had a sign on his office at the NYTimes, that read  "abandon hopefully all who enter here."  Presumably he is chatting with Dante as we speak.  I also want to apologize for some dead links from last week.  From now on I will test all of them.  It appears that some links expire, such as on Truthout, so I will try to go to original sources as much as possible.  I also recommend going to Truthout, reading some truth and making an appropriate donation.

Classical Grammy
It is nice that classical music gets a shot at the Grammy awards.  I recall reading an interview with the violinist Mischa Vengerov of his experience as a winner. Rich Capparela is a classical dj on KUSC Los Angeles
This report on his Grammy gig is nice.

American Astronomical Society
 The recent meeting of the American Astronomical Society had so
much good stuff that I am going to let you choose what you want
to read from this summary collection

Evolution of Horses

  The picture is an artist's impression of a Yukon horse from 25,000 years ago.
The evolutionary history of equine species is very interesting.
I had always been told that while horses originated in North
America and emigrated across  Beringia to Eurasia, they were
driven extinct by human overhunting in their ancient home. Now
there is new evidence that seems to indicate that climate
change was behind most of the extinction although humans did hunt
them.

Human Rights and Politics: The Rant Department
Imagine a rape victim being punished with 100 lashes for "having sex" outside
of wedlock. Imagine a school girl getting 90 lashes for assaulting a teacher.You only need to go to Saudi Arabia, the "moderate Arab country" whose oil causes all the Western powers to love
it.  Indeed the school girl required a sanction for hitting her headmistress with a glass in a dispute

over a cell phone, but it should be proportionate.  The Filipina migrant worker is certainly a victim of a
judicial system and a society gone amok.


There is an interesting faceoff in Haaretz between Akiva Eldar
and Gideon Shimoni about the applicability of the term
apartheid to what is happening to Palestinians here.  Worth reading,
IMHO, Eldar wins the argument hands down.  Shimoni wallows in legalisms
and propaganda.


Sodom and Gomorrah in our midst
Welcome to --Sodom & Gomorrah
A woman and her child are due to be deported to Ethiopia
because her husband has suffered a stroke and is in a nursing
home, i.e. no longer living together as man and wife. She is
not Jewish, but has started proceedings to convert to Judaism.
Now she is to be deported with her child. Instead of helping
her, we are deporting her. Have we gone mad?

The prophets had something to say about this:

Ezekiel 16:48-50 (New International Version)

48 As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, your
sister Sodom and her daughters never did what you and your
daughters have done. 49 " 'Now this was the sin of your sister
Sodom: She and her
 daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not
 help the poor and needy.
 50 They were haughty and did detestable things before me.
 Therefore I did away with them as you have seen.

יחזקאל ט"ז
מח חַי-אָנִי, נְאֻם אֲדֹנָי יְהוִה, אִם-עָשְׂתָה סְדֹם אֲחוֹתֵךְ, הִיא וּבְנוֹתֶיהָ--כַּאֲשֶׁר עָשִׂית, אַתְּ וּבְנוֹתָיִךְמט הִנֵּה-זֶה הָיָה, עֲו‍ֹן סְדֹם אֲחוֹתֵךְ:  גָּאוֹן שִׂבְעַת-לֶחֶם וְשַׁלְוַת הַשְׁקֵט, הָיָה לָהּ וְלִבְנוֹתֶיהָ, וְיַד-עָנִי וְאֶבְיוֹן, לֹא הֶחֱזִיקָהנ וַתִּגְבְּהֶינָה, וַתַּעֲשֶׂינָה תוֹעֵבָה לְפָנָי; וָאָסִיר אֶתְהֶן, כַּאֲשֶׁר רָאִיתִי.  {ס}

Isaiah 1:9-10 (Today's New International Version)

9 Unless the LORD Almighty
       had left us some survivors,
       we would have become like Sodom,
       we would have been like Gomorrah.

    10 Hear the word of the LORD,
       you rulers of Sodom;
       listen to the instruction of our God,
       you people of Gomorrah!
 
ישעיהו א'
ט לוּלֵי יְהוָה צְבָאוֹת, הוֹתִיר לָנוּ שָׂרִיד כִּמְעָט--כִּסְדֹם הָיִינוּ, לַעֲמֹרָה דָּמִינוּ.  {פ}
י שִׁמְעוּ דְבַר-יְהוָה, קְצִינֵי סְדֹם; הַאֲזִינוּ תּוֹרַת אֱלֹהֵינוּ, עַם עֲמֹרָה.



 Eli Yishai and his minions are indeed the rulers of Sodom and
people of Gomorrah--they wish to make our country goyrein   
in analogy to an ideology that we shall not mention here.



 
I am going to rant a bit more than usual about the local scene,
so those who lack patience for my fulminations, can sign off
now. I would like to suggest that all read the article by Yoram
Koniuk in last Friday's Haaretz on the State of Tel Aviv versus
the the State of Judea. In some ways it is much more
illuminating of reality than Benvenisti's essay in Haaretz
about the death of the two state solution.  Hebrew original
 .English version 
A discussion is going on in Facebook between Avner Cohen, Daniel
Oz and a few others.

 Geneva Accord etc.
Last Thursday, I wasted a day at a
symposium  sponsored by the Geneva Initiative.
which, while unrealistic, at least involved
Palestinians in its formulation. What I inferred from the
proceedings was that the two state solution is a zombie, dead
but not aware of the fact yet. I heard a series of retired
generals who spent their active careers imposing the conquest
(used advisedly rather than occupation) and all its
implications for human rights repression, suddenly returning
from the road to Damascus and explaining (in their execrable
military Hebrew) what needs to be done to implement the two
state solution. The only non-nonsensical thing they had to
offer was a frightening prediction of what we will have if the
two state solution does not come about. Their consensus was
that we would not get a binational apartheid state, but a
Jewish ghetto inside the wall and a Hamas-controlled West Bank
outside it, with constant friction and attacks and a periodic
Cast Lead operation. Lovely thought indeed.

I am bringing this up because the local level of insanity seems
to be reaching new heights. Obama has declared a pox on both
our houses, for which I have some empathy and the government
is trying to generate a posthumous version of Tuchman's March
of Folly
. Only two weeks ago the special envoy Mitchell was
talking about winding up negotiations in 
two years
and now we are told that the US administration has thrown up
its hands in despair. I suppose we will just continue our futile
demonstrations, at least for the record.  In the meantime the public
is fascinated by the Natanyahu family domestic staff squabbles and
some TV idiocy called Big Brother of which I know nothing.

I am beginning to feel guilty about not having been arrested
for protesting what is going on at 
Sheikh Jarrakh
in Jerusalem. Perhaps I will go this week. Uri Avneri is a few
years older than I am and he and Rachel are always on the
firing line.

Yossi Peled, a retired general, minister without portfolio and village idiot of the Knesset
is trying to drum up a war in the 
North
but at least the government and army are not buying it at the moment. This is the same
character who proposed that Israel put sanctions on the US if
they fail to support our policies. March of Folly indeed.

Judith Harel provides the OCHA updates on protection of
civilians in the OT.
Report for OCHA 
English
For some reason, I cannot bring up the Hebrew version of this report.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Update January 20, 2010, thoughts and even a few rants

IN MEMORIAM 40 YEARS ON






January 15 was the 40th anniversary of the death of the Hebrew
poetess
Leah Goldberg.

I append an article on her life and
work. in English and  a link to a more detailed discussion including her newly discovered novel in Hebrew.  There is an interesting comparison of her experiences as a young writer in Berlin just before the rise of the Nazis to power and those of Christopher Isherwood who actually lived not far from her in Berlin at the time.  A discussion of her work in English with links to some of the above subjects can be found here.



There has been considerable interest in Israel in the legacy of
Franz Kafka and the recent legal battle over it. His close
friend, the late Max Brod, held a large archive of his letters
and writings which he bequeathed to his secretary (partner?)
who left  the archive to her daughter, when she died. The
latter has been selling items from it to various musea, but now
there is a court order to open the vaults and possibly have the
material turned over to the National Library. I append the
latest report of the ongoing fight.
HAITI

The Haiti catastrophe is incredible and indeed people all over
the world are responding. If you have not donated go to
Oxfam
and find a place to pitch in and help.

 KING AND ROBINSON


We mark the birthdays of two great leaders, Martin Luther King
and Jackie Robinson this week. Sheila Johnson writes a
passionate call to live up to their legacy
as does Wilmer Leon III for MLK

The antithesis of these great humanists can be found on the
media today. Taking cheap shots at the people of  Haiti is as vile an
act as can be imagined.  Indeed one
might be tempted to ignore Limbaugh and Robertson, but they
have followers and are dangerous
men.

Sometimes you wonder what makes people tick. Oliver Stone is
making a documentary film that "will place Hitler in context"
and show that "Hitler was an easy scapegoat." Free speech is
great, but you can see what some people do with it to point of
rationalizing Hitler!   Click the link for a cogent comment. There
are things that have no context such as mass murder, terrorism,
slavery and repression to name a few. I have met people in
Israel who express satisfaction when suicide bombings take
place elsewhere because it is "good for Israel" that other
people experience terror. Indifference to the sufferings of
anyone who is not of the given group is a characteristic of
monsters.

 Killing children in the name of God
 This is
dangerous stuff and should be dealt with firmly. Incitement to
murder is not protected free speech, especially if it comes
from a religious leader. Of course, our Orthodox brothers tend
to go for the violent. The former Chief Rabbi Ovadia Yosef once
called for the assassination of Yossi Sarid who was Education
Minister at the time and for some reason his policies were too
humanistic for the great rabbi.

Pluralism is a major issue in Israel and it keeps getting
worse. We of the liberal persuasion need all the help we can
get and it seems to be forthcoming.

 Former Chief
Justice Aharon Barak   has come out in support of the
International Criminal Court. I hope the ICC does get a chance
to judge our criminals because our Army appears adamant in its
refusal to confront what goes on in its ranks.

What Christopher Hitchens  has to say about Iran applies as well
to dominant parts of the body politic in many other countries,
including Israel and the US under a Republican regime.
In the US they have a constitution to protect them, we have
nothing.

OK, enough pontificating..  Let me wind this up with some humor
from Gene Weingarten and some good news on the human rights front, a moratorium on capital
punishment in Mongolia.

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

January 13, 2010, Thoughts on various things

IN MEMORIAM


Miep Gies the last of the protectors of Anna Frank and her family died this week at age 100.  May the memory of a righteous woman be blessed.  There are far too few people like her in this world.  The New York Times  obituary tells the story of her heroism better than I could.

I am going to deal with two issues this week, the abuse of women in Israel and climate change.  Before we get to these topics, let us look at a few miscellany.
  We also get some good news on the human rights front, this time
from Mexico
This is a case about which  I remember including writing letters and
generating adrenaline. Indigenous people get the short end of
the stick all throughout the Western Hemisphere, but Mexico is
one of the worst offenders. I recall a case in Chiapas State in
which an indigenous family sent a 14 year old girl (who could
speak Spanish) to the police station to report the theft of a
goat. She was raped by five policemen. Amnesty International
ranted worldwide
until the government finally blew the coverup and sent the
offending cops to jail.
Gene Weingarten did not come up with a new Below the Beltway  this week, so I
am giving you an old one about
Garry Trudeau
For an old Doonesbury buff such as myself, this is fascinating

For anyone interested in astronomy here is a useful newsletter   The discussion of Pluto and plutoids is interesting. Some
people took it to heart when Pluto was evicted from the planet
family, but it has a new family of dwarf planets called
plutoids and is not really lonely..
This is worth reading to get a fresh look at MidEast politics and culture
I know from talking to Arab colleagues that the attitudes of
Arab governments towards science, education and empowerment of
women are indeed bound up in the general backwardness of the
same communities that a thousand years ago were in the
forefront of the intellectual progress of Western civilization
while Christendom wallowed in the Dark Ages.

On economics and society in Israel
in Israel--indeed the resiliency that the economy in Israel
displayed in the recent crisis indicates that something is
strong. Of course, the banks here obey the principle of loaning
money only to people who do not need it and thus did not fall
into the sub-prime trap. The government did carry out a major
bailout in the early  1980's when the bubble that the banks had
created by buying one another's shares burst and the public was
left with depreciated bank shares. The government stepped in
bought the banks and only now has managed to unload its shares
on the market. The hi-tech boom here only goes as far as
development of a system and then selling it for what Israelis
think are big bucks and the buyers in the US regard as bargain
basement.
Reports on protection of civilians in the occupied territories
provided by Judith Harel from OCHA
English
Hebrew
The Israel security services again showed their basic
inhumanity and brutal evil. Seventeen people from Gaza who are
sigh-impaired and had cornea transplant opportunities in
Ramallah were denied permission to go for the operations. For
full  details see this site.


This is
beyond ranting.

Now the Interior Ministry has instituted a new Inquisition. It
seems that an Israeli who wants to marry a Filipina is guilty
of miscegenation. It is of the same pattern as the plan to have
people report young Jews abroad who are dating "others"
rachmana
litzlan...

Amira Hass spent a few days in Cairo and Gaza with the people who
came to express solidarity with the people of Gaza. It seems that
Hamas is not terribly friendly to its supporters from around
the world. I am not surprised.

Gideon Levy makes a good case for moving our entire country to
an institution for the insane and subjecting all of us to
psychiatric observation.


Women in Israel



The issue of women's rights in Israel is getting more critical.
Please sign the petition.  The arrest of Anat Hoffman for wearing a

talit (prayer shawl) is
 totally unacceptable behavior on the part of the police  Here is an
.interview with her 

 The question of treatment of women, whether on buses   in 
 Israel, at the Western Wall or in   homes across the world
 is worthy of action.  I append a blog from Amnesty USA on the
 subject.of empowerment
 The bottom line is that men need not fear empowerment of women
 nor can they gain anything from degradation and abuse of
 women.
 There is an interesting discussion on the role of the
internet
 in the liberation of women. The article gets a critical
  review 

on the Web. 
Finally, note that Amnesty International 
is calling for worldwide action on behalf of women in the gender trap of poverty and discrimination.
 Climate Change



In the spirit of think globally, act locally, I am calling the local people to join Israel Greenpeace 
in protest over the idiotic idea of building a coal burning power plant in Ashkelon

There is talk about clean coal etc. but it is all nonsense and designed to mislead.  To drive the point home, I am appending an article written by Dr. James Hansen , the world leader in the struggle against climate destruction about coal burning plants in Britain.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Starting the New Year January 6, 2010

We returned last week from our travels (YandA report on blog) and on Saturday night participated in a



demonstration against the siege of Gaza.
We were as effective as usual, i.e. not at all, but we continue to try.  The demonstration in Tel Aviv
marked the anniversary of operation Cast LeadGush Shalom took an active part.  Many people spoke, but in my humble opinion  Nurit Peled-Elhanan  spoke most eloquently for all of us.  In a similar context, I would like to present an article  by the human rights lawyer Michael Sfard.on operation
Cast Lead. No one could have said it better.
Hebrew original

  English translation

Before I go on with my rants (some people do not care for them, but they are important in my view), let me bring in some good news.  Sometimes you read something that encourages you. I would like
to share this story of women in Colombia who are doing
something about the  world in which they live and are empowering
themselves as well.


Good news indeed that Aminatou Haidar, a Sahrawi human rights
activist who has spent the past month on hunger strike in
Lanzarote airport, has returned home.   This has to do with the
independence struggle of Western Morocco.   Without going into the
merits of the arguments of both sides, it is clear that her human rights were
violated by the government of Morocco.

A landmark treaty on enforced disappearances has moved a step
closer to entering into force after being ratified by two more
countries. The International Convention for the Protection of
All Persons from Enforced Disappearance (Disappearances
Convention) now needs just two more ratifications to become
binding after Burkina Faso and Chile became the 17th and 18th
states to ratify it last month.


Just as we thought that tolerance was winning and that
homophobia was a thing of the past, the parliament of Uganda is
coming up with a shocker. A bill before the house calls for the
death penalty for gays and lesbians.

The new fossil lady Ardi is making waves in evolutionary
biology.


An update from the Planetary Society blog sums up 2009 and
tells us more of the sad plight of the Martian rover .
Spirit
A quadricentennial occasion is coming up this week.On the night of January 7, 1610, Galileo pointed his telescope at Jupiter and discovered the moons orbiting around it.  Jupiter is bright in the sky now along with Mars.
Take out your binoculars and have a look. 
Jupiter is easily located in the southwest just after sunset. Jupiter will be the most obvious object in this part of the sky since the constellations of this area are composed of very dim stars. Binoculars will reveal Jupiter’s four largest moons, the Galilean moons, named for their discoverer Galileo Galilei. A small telescope will reveal two dark bands in Jupiter’s atmosphere. A slightly larger telescope may reveal Jupiter’s Great Red Spot, but only if it is on the side of the planet facing Earth. Careful observation under dark skies will be necessary to pick out this elusive storm.
Turning toward the east, we find Mars rising around 6:30 p.m.  Enjoy the sky.


In general, Galileo is a historical figure of eternal relevance.  He founded empirical
science as we know it today. Galileo got funding for telescope development (he did not
invent it) from the Medici family. He sold them on the idea
that their merchant ship captains could spot pirates before the
pirates spotted them. He named the moons after the Medici
family, but Cassini in 1690 gave them the mythological names
that they bear today and the four of them are known collectively
as the Galilean moons. Venice had a speculative futures market
since no one knew what cargoes had escaped the pirates. Brokers
would send out fast pinnaces to see the flag codes by which the
captains would announce their cargo. Galileo took a telescope
to the top of the Campanile di San Marco obtained the
information at the speed of light and used it at the speed with which he
could send messengers with money to the market. He became quite
wealthy from this applied science. He also got into trouble
with the ecclesiastical establishment for his scientific achievements..

Four centuries ago, “heretics” who disagreed with Church
orthodoxy were burned at the stake. Many were the dissenting
views that could send offenders to a fiery end.  As an example of
what could get you into such a hot spot, consider:
 "Ignorance is the most delightful science in the world, because
it is acquired without pain and keeps the mind from melancholy"

– Giordano Bruno (1548–1600), Lo Spaccio de la Bestia
Trionfante (1584; translated as The Expulsion of the
Triumphant Beast)  Bruno is best known as a proponent of heliocentrism and the infinity of the universe. His cosmological theories went beyond the Copernican model in identifying the sun as just one of an infinite number of independently moving heavenly bodies: he is the first man to have conceptualized the universe as a continuum where the stars we see at night are of identical nature as the sun.  He was burned at the stake by authorities in 1600 after the Roman Inquisition found him guilty of heresy. After his death he gained considerable fame; in the 19th and early 20th centuries; commentators focusing on his astronomical beliefs regarded him as a martyr for free thought and modern scientific ideas. 



Galileo came
within a singed whisker of the same fate in 1633, for arguing
that the sun (and not the Earth) was at the center of the solar
system. He was saved only because he was already famous, had
good friends in high government places, and agreed to recant
his “heresy” (at least publicly) and submit to living under
house arrest until the end of his days. The speeches of his
accusers sound like those of climate change deniers of today. In
general, there is a conservative tendency to back away from
reality and honest dealing with the modern world.   The generals who
rejected the tank in favor of the horse in World War I and the brass hats
who court-martialed Billy Mitchell and thus led to the unprepared state
of the US at the beginning of World War II are only a few examples of this type
of rigid establishment thinking.   The Catholic Church finally agreed that the
Earth moves around the Sun in 1822 and the last cavalry units in the US army
were mechanized in 1940.  Polish cavalry actually charged German Panzer
units at the beginning if World War II.  One can think of many other things that suffered a similar
fate. Let me include a quote from an article by someone named Mike Carlton
who writes in the National Times of Australia.  "Trial by jury, universal suffrage, 
Darwin's theory of the origin of species, an end to the employment of children in
coalmines, the abolition of debtors' prisons and the workhouse,
the establishment of trade unions, the invention of the
horseless carriage and the steam locomotive, the introduction
of the basic wage and the eight-hour working day and social
security and universal health insurance: all these things and
so many more were fought to the last ditch by the forces of
reaction.


In the present,  the rabble of
climate-change deniers would have us believe that the science
is a fraud and that any agreement in Copenhagen on carbon
pollution reduction would be the thin edge of a communist plot
to rule the world. They know little and learn less. The march
of folly goes on."
In this context, we can understand the fight over health
insurance in the US.  I am now reading a book called The
Psychology of Military Incompetence
by Norman Dixon.
Among the other lovely traits of the military caste, he deals with
resistance to innovation, such as the issues mentioned above.
In our army, one may be sure
that if ground penetrating radar had been used for detecting
tunnels, as it has been used in Korea for fifty years or more,
Gilead Shalit would not be in the hands of the Hamas. This is
not a rant, but a comment.

OK, let us get on to more pleasant things. 


Gene Weingarten in Below the Beltway
has resolved to become cool in his language this year and I
wish him luck. Indeed many of us use obsolete terms, especially
we elderly folks and I am twenty years older than Gene
Weingarten. Still, there are young uncool types as well. My
fancy touchy-feely cell phone tells me that it is dialling
(sic) a number although there is nothing like a dial around. It
also has a screen touch button for the "dial" command. The Hebrew word for
locomotive is derived from the word for steam although the last
steam locomotive here was junked over 50 years ago. Haim Hefer wrote
a song about the last journey from Beersheva to Haifa. Alas, it
was junked for scrap and I could not find it in the railway
museum, Now we have diesel-electric steam locomotives.


The Darwin awards are given every year  for people who improve our species
by removing themselves.


I append a set that Judy sent me --thanks Judy and on the site
you can find many more:

AND the winner is:

1. When his 38 caliber revolver failed to fire at his intended
victim during a hold-up in Provo, Utah, would-be robber Jason
Ellison did something that can only inspire wonder. He peered
down the barrel and tried the trigger again. This time it
worked.

And now, the honorable mentions:

2. The chef at a hotel in Switzerland lost a finger in a meat
cutting machine and after a little shopping around, submitted a
claim to his insurance company. The company expecting
negligence sent out one of its men to have a look for himself.
He tried the machine and he also lost a finger. The chef's
claim was approved.


3. A man who shoveled snow for an hour to clear a space for his
car during a blizzard in Chicago returned with his vehicle to
find a woman had taken the space. Understandably, he shot her.

4. After stopping for drinks at an illegal bar, a Zimbabwean
bus driver found that the 20 mental patients he was supposed to
be transporting from Harare to Bulawayo had escaped... Not
wanting to admit his incompetence, the driver went to a nearby
bus stop and offered everyone waiting there a free ride. He
then delivered the passengers to the mental hospital, telling
the staff that the patients were very excitable and prone to
bizarre fantasies.. The deception wasn't discovered for 3 days.

5.. A teenager was in the hospital recovering from serious head
wounds received from an oncoming train. When asked how he
received the injuries, the lad told police that he was simply
trying to see how close he could get his head to a moving train
before he was hit.

6. A man walked into a Louisiana Circle-K, put a $20 bill on
the counter, and asked for change. When the clerk opened the
cash drawer, the man pulled a gun and asked for all the cash in
the register, which the clerk promptly provided. The man took
the cash from the clerk and fled, leaving the $20 bill on the
counter. The total amount of cash he got from the drawer...
$15. [If someone points a gun at you and gives you money, is a
crime committed?]

7. Seems an Arkansas guy wanted some beer pretty badly.. He
decided that he'd just throw a cinder block through a liquor
store window, grab some booze, and run. So he lifted the cinder
block and heaved it over his head at the window. The cinder
block bounced back and hit the would-be thief on the head,
knocking him unconscious. The liquor store window was made of
Plexiglas. The whole event was caught on videotape.

8. As a female shopper exited a South Carolina convenience
store, a man grabbed her purse and ran. The clerk called 911
immediately, and the woman was able to give them a detailed
description of the snatcher. Within minutes, the police
apprehended the snatcher. They put him in the car and drove
back to the store. The thief was then taken out of the car and
told to stand there for a positive ID. To which he replied,
"Yes, officer, that's her. That's the lady I stole the purse
from."

9.. The Ann Arbor News crime column reported that a man walked
into a Burger King in Ypsilanti, Michigan at 5 A.M., flashed a
gun, and demanded cash. The clerk turned him down because he
said he couldn't open the cash register without a food order.
When the man ordered onion rings, the clerk said they weren't
available for breakfast. The man, frustrated, walked away. [*A
5-STAR STUPIDITY AWARD WINNER]

10. When a man attempted to siphon gasoline from a motor home
parked on an Atlanta street, he got much more than he bargained
for. Police arrived at the scene to find a very sick man curled
up next to a motor home near spilled sewage. A police spokesman
said that the man admitted to trying to steal gasoline, but he
plugged his siphon hose into the motor home's sewage tank by
mistake. The owner of the vehicle declined to press charges
saying that it was the best laugh he'd ever had.

In the interest of bettering mankind, please share these with
friends and family....unless of course one of these individuals
by chance is a distant relative or long lost friend. In that
case, be glad they are distant and hope they remain lost.

Next week we shall sample the Dilbert induhvidual populaton 
and its brilliance.
For example, quotes such as:
"I've been running around like a chicken with my legs cut off!"

"The monkey is in their court."

"There's more than one way to screw a cat!"

"That really grinds my goat."

Have a nice week everyone.
.

Thursday, December 31, 2009

End of the Year and Home from Abroad

Hi Dear Friends,
You have been spared my cluttering up of your computers for a
few weeks because I have been traveling. I spent the week of
December 13-18
in San Francisco attending the annual fall meeting of the
American Geophysical Union.  I had a good meeting with good
science interactions and meetings with old friends. Then I went
to San Mateo where my cousin Fred and his wife Mariel (a high
school classmate of mine) live and we were joined for the
weekend by my granddaughter Maya who is a student in Eugene OR.
After a wonderful weekend, I flew to Berlin to meet Yosefa and
to visit her daughter Galia and her family including three
grandchildren. Details of the vacation part of this trip are on the 
YandA blog.  Yosefa's blog of her trip to Europe with her children
in which she describes tracking Yossi, her late husband, in the southwest
of France where he was hidden during the war has been posted.  It might
be of interest for anyone who has any connection to the Holocaust and
World War II.  Anyone interested
in the blog can write to me or to  Yosefa for the link.

Before I start my usual rants and raves, let us look at a few
things of general interest.
If you have ever wanted to ask a Nobel Laureate a question and
get an answer, you can now do this. It is available via YouTube
and the Nobel Foundation. I thank Phil Plait and his Bad
Astronomy blog for this information

Congratulations, it's a  star!

Here is a view taken by Cassini of Rhea reappearing from behind Titan.
Thank you imaging team for something lovely.



For more  details on the image click.

A bit of insight into Kwanzaa of which I really know nothing and find
interesting.
People are making a big deal out of the end of the decade. Ten
years ago they talked about the end of the millennium. In fact,
the decade will end at the end of 2010 and the new millennium
began Jan. 1, 2001. Simply,  Pope Gregory XIII
set up the calendar with the aid of a commission which was led
by Christopher Clavius,, but did not provide for a zero year,
i.e. after 1BC came 1AD.
In any case, this list of things that
have gone obsolete since 2000 is interesting.

The Huffington Post provides some entertainment

I have a few Gene Weingarten goodies for you since I missed a
few weeks. Those who like parties can pass on this first one and the
hatchet job on Cheney is very well done.
In the latter, do not miss the link to his questions to the
publisher about the forthcoming Cheney autobiography.

Rant and Raves of the Week
The American Lieberman seems to be of similar mind to the
Israeli  Lieberman  
The latter proposed nuking the Aswan Dam and the former seems to
favor carpet bombing of Yemen.
Emanuel Todd is a man for whom I have great respect. In 1975 he
predicted that the Soviet Union would collapse on a time scale
of 15 years. He hit the jackpot. His criterion for collapse of
an empire was high infant mortality and wars with
inconsequential adversaries inter alia. His 2002 book After the
Empire which dealt with the collapse of the United States has
been right on some issues, wrong on others. I append an
interview with him that was published in Le Monde and translated in Truthout.  I strongly recommend
a donation to Truthout

The execution of a mentally ill man who was duped by gangsters
into carrying 4 kg of heroin in a suitcase into China is an
abominable crime. The outcry in the UK and in the EU is totally
justified. The Chinese are a long way from joining the family
of civilized nations. Instead they belong with the barbarians
who execute people, such as Iran and another very large country
that presume to evaluate the human rights record of others...

The continued persecution of
Mordechai Vannunu
is revolting. He cannot even have a love affair without the
security people in his bed. It would be much easier to let him
live abroad since he certainly has no new information that is
not already in the public domain. The obsession of the Israel
security establishment with its own prestige and neuroses is
completely out of hand and the courts are usually afraid to
deal with them. There are many there who should be on Koko's
list, but I shall not name them since it might lead to my
premature demise. The case of the documentary film, "The Secret
Kingdom" by Nir Toib is an example.of this.  Similarly they tried
to prevent the publication of Avner Cohen's book on the development of
nuclear weapons although it contained no classified material.  Eventually
the book was published in the US and by some miracle Cohen escaped the
torture chamber.

I am not sure whether this rabbinic bull  by our two chief rabbis on abortion belongs to
rants on human rights or rants about superstition.


In any case,
we can rest assured that the Messiah is not coming any day
soon, but if these Neanderthal rabbis have their way, freedom
of choice is in big danger in Israel.


Good news, the High Court of Justice has ruled that the
prohibition of Palestinian use of Highway 443 is illegal and in
violation of basic human rights.  For the record Yosefa photographed
me from behind at a demonstration in the West Bank in Beit Sira against
the apartheid policy vis a vis use of the road.

We took in a good dose of tear gas from our friendly soldiers.  In fact, they waited for
the demonstration to end and to start to disperse before opening fire.  Nice of them--more
candidates for Koko's list


More good news albeit bad for those who would
manipulate us by inculcation of fear

Apropos manipulation, note how climate change is being handled
by those who have an interest in the status quo

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Mostly rants, a few musings and some family news

Rants
This week I have a lot to rant about, not that this is new.  The first big one is marking the 25th anniversary of the monstrous atrocity of Bhopal in India, where a leakage at a pesticide plant poisoned hundreds of thousands of people..  This is an outrage I want you to rant about as well. Twenty
five years have passed since the incredible disaster at Bhopal
and neither Dow Chemical nor its subsidiary Union Carbide nor
the government of India has taken responsibility and made
amends to the people in India who are their victims. The
government has made countless promises but has done nothing.
For details click here
Facebook members join the cause You may write to the
prime minister of India via his Web site
You should also write to
Anthony Leveris, CEO, The Dow Chemical
Company 2030 Dow Center Midland, MI 48674 U.S.A.
If you are
registered with Amnesty International, go to www.amnesty.org
and if you are not, go there and register!  See:
http://www.netphotograph.com/samples/lowrez/bhopal_10248-004-20060223.jpg

I have a few more
Amnesty International AICrisis

In addition, I have a special rant that will call for some action  this week.

Before Climate Meeting, a Revival of Skepticism - NYTimes.com

Everyone is into global warming this week, so I shall just note
that as the Maldives government met under water, now the Nepal
cabinet met on Everest, I hope the point is getting across.


Burma
For many years the United Nations has ignored widespread and
systematic crimes committed by Burma's military junta,
including the destruction of more than 3,300 villages in
eastern Burma, widespread use of rape as a weapon of war
against ethnic minorities, the forced displacement of over 1
million refugees and internally displaced people, tens of
thousands of child soldiers, and millions used as slave labor.

Despite these appalling crimes, no government is speaking out
on this issue. All governments should urge the United Nations
to establish a Commission of Inquiry, which would investigate
these crimes and could lead to prosecutions. So far  all
governments have remained silent.

Please write to your parliamentarians and ask them to support
the call for the United Nations to investigate crimes against
humanity in Burma
In Israel, I suggest writing to Foreign Minister Lieberman and
making the following points:

State your concern about crimes against humanity in Burma.
There is well documented evidence including from UN General
Assembly and Commission on Human Rights resolutions over many
years of widespread torture, forced displacement, sexual
violence, extra-judicial killings and forced labor and that
civilians are deliberately targeted.



Dolphins
There is an opportunity to do something to save dolphins from
the Japanese fishing industry. Please go to
this site and pitch in.

 
 Hanukka

On a blog that I follow a mother posted  a complaint about the militaristic brainwash her child was getting in   kindergarten  
I suggest an alternative version from Talmud Avoda Zara 8a.  For some reason the text will not post so go to
 this site 
for the text in Hebrew and English. In general, the secularization of religious symbols and holidays and their exploitation for propaganda purposes is old Zionist policy.  The historical truth about Hanukka as we best know it was that there was a civil war over the issue of assimilation into Greek culture including the syncretistic religious tolerance  of the Selucid kingdom.  The god of the Jews was invited to join the pantheon, but He wanted sole worship and a capital G from His chosen people who themselves were not allowed to make any choices.  In modern terms, we all might have been on the side of the Hellenizers and would have regarded killing someone for a religious action as somewhat inappropriate to say the least.  Of course, now we tell the kids that bad King Antiochus would not let us practice our religion, that he was strong and we were weak, but with the aid of God we won etc. down through the ages until today when we have Antiochus Ahmedinajad/Hannia/whoever threatening us.  The answer of course, as we internalized from the Holocaust, is that we must be strong (OK with that) and since we were victims, we can victimize whomever we wish now(not OK with that).
We also should not let ourselves be troubled by details such as liberal democracy, human rights and other such goyish folderol.  Yaacov Neeman our Justice Minister has just declared that instead of
a parliamentary system, we must institute Jewish law, i.e. the
halacha which is our version of sharia. He must be forced to
resign.  Of course, he is now trying to backpedal but it should not be allowed to fly.
 Merav Michaeli 
has taken a shot at a sacred cow, the all powerful and worshiped Israeli army.  It is about time that someone took a critical look at the monster in our midst.  It took legislation and public opprobrium to get senior officers to stop regarding their office staff as their harem
and Ms Michaeli has now taken a stick to their political and economic clout.  She points out what most of us
have known for a long time that the military caste in Israel are an economic sector with interests that conflict with those of the citizenry. It is no accident that they work hard to prevent peace, are in bed with the settlers in the occupied territories and feather their own nest very nicely.
 Our Life
OK, enough ranting.  This is a busy weekend. On Friday we had planned to participate
in the Human Rights Day demonstration in Tel Aviv, but the time
was preempted by my extended family who scheduled a memorial
for my niece Tirza at noon. Tirza died just a year ago of
cancer at age 71 and is sorely missed by all of us. Naturally
her memorial trumped the demonstration.

In the evening we have a family dinner and the lighting of the first Hannuka candle
and on Saturday we move on to Yosefa's family. We start with a
memorial for her late husband Yossi at Kibbutz Kfar Hahoresh
where he is buried. Then we move on to Bet Yitzhak for a family
gathering and a powerpoint presentation of the trip Yosefa made
with her children and dear friend Herve last month in which
they traced Yossi's footsteps in the southwest part of France
where he was hidden from the Germans by local people. The story
of the trip will be posted as a blog and anyone who is
interested is invited to request the link from Yosefa or from
me.

On Saturday night, there is a fund raiser concert for my
synagogue with the Rabbi's daughter, an opera singer, providing
a recital. It is not clear that we will make it since I have a
flight at 0500 the next morning to the annual fall meeting of
the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco. After the
meeting, on the 18th my granddaughter Maya will come from
Eugene OR and we will spend the weekend with my cousin Fred and
his wife Mariel in San Mateo.

From California I fly off to Berlin where Y and A will join up
to become YandA and spend a week visiting her daughter Galia
and family during the children's Xmas break. We return together
to Israel on December 28. If this sounds hectic, it is. We are
supposed to be living the sedate lives of retirees...

Science and Odds and Ends

The nuts are really out in places where oxygen is in short
supply. Welcome to the nutty city of Denver where the citizens
will vote in a referendum about setting up a commission for the
investigation of
UFO sightings.

Last week I forgot to include the Gene Weingarten column which
was really funny, here it is
I tried Gene's system of random googling and came up with some
strange questions under why, such as the following which explains why people
should avoid vegetables
This week Gene is on vacation and the Post ran a column from
2002 which I found amusing. Indeed, it is not nice to make fun
of people's names

This is most interesting and indicates that fMRI may have been
oversold a bit.

 The issue of mammography does not appear to be resolved. Here
is a new study that shows that the radiation exposure is not
worth the risk for younger women.

The Huffington Post pulled out what it regarded as
the funniest Facebook snafus of
all time. Some of them of course are a result of computers in
the hands of computer illiterates, such as our friend Tracy who
shared details of her sex life by mistake.
Some of them are even funny, others just sophomoric.