Diplomacy and Terrorism

David Bernstein quotes Glenn Greenwald as saying:

Terrorism ends when the causes of it are addressed, typically via diplomatic means.

Greenwald has a point. After all we all remember how successfully we used diplomacy to bring an end to causes of terrorism back in….

…well, I mean sometime we must have…

…nope, on second thought, diplomacy has never brought an end to terrorism. 

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The Vile Cynthia McKinney

Traveling to Gaza in a stunt to aid Hamas, she complains because the Israeli navy damaged her boat. I would suggest that she got off lightly.

The activists, organized by the Free Gaza Group, said their 66-foot yacht called “SS Dignity” would defy an Israeli blockade of Gaza and ferry 16 activists and three tons of Cypriot-donated supplies. The supplies are intended to help treat the wounded from Israeli bombings against targets in Gaza, in retaliation for rocket fire aimed at civilians in southern Israeli towns.

She cared not at all when Hamas thugs were daily bombarding Israeli towns in an attempt to kill as many Jews as possible. Only when Israel defended itself was her sense of justice aroused.

Daily life near Gaza:

Moshe Turgeman spent a lot of time in Gaza before the intifada. Not only did he serve in the Israeli army there, but he used to get drinks and hang out in area frequently. “There are good people in Gaza ,” he tells me. Hearing this is rather remarkable because in August 2006, Moshe’s house took a direct hit from a Qassam rocket launched from Gaza . He managed to get his kids to safety but he was injured in the attack. I ask Moshe what life is like in Sderot today. “It’s not life,” he responds. His children are scared, he fears going outside and his disability has made it impossible to work. There were times, Moshe says, when he thought the warning siren was broken because it sounded non-stop for hours. “Forty-eight Qassams fell in a single day,” he says. “The scariest thing is that sometimes they fall without an alert—at any moment.” Moshe knows of what he speaks. One day he was ironing a shirt on the upper floor of his modest apartment. In an instant, a rocket fell meters from him and shrapnel nearly pierced his heart. He shows me the jagged hole in the window next to which he was standing during the attack. “It’s not life” he repeats.

The Commentary article from which the above quote is taken is worth reading in full.

“Uncertainty Management”

A discussion about the financial crisis, Wall Street, management and accountability at Neptunus Lex. The initial post is merely the starting point for some insightful comments by readers. Worth reading in full.

There seems to be a trend toward diminished accountability for top members of our political and business elites. People who should resign don’t. Leaders who should fire those people don’t. The military still seems pretty good (perhaps it’s no accident that the discussion I linked is on a blog written and frequented by military people). Accountability standards in small business and many professions, where failure tends to be immediate and personal, still seem OK. But things appear to be on the decline in big institutions and government. I don’t know if that’s because government has grown so big and intrusive that it drags down standards everywhere, or because our society has deteriorated, or both. It’s a bad trend either way.

Bored and Crocheting

Now for something more than a little strange…

 

The work of German artist Patricia Waller who seems to combine true skill at crochet with seriously warped imagination.

I do find it interesting how we attach certain concepts to a particular medium and find it jarring when we see other concepts rendered in that medium. 

For example, crocheted, pink, S&M gear.