9/11: the twelfth anniversary

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ll skip all the usual observations about how amazing it is that so much time has passed. But it is and it has.

And I’ll skip all the solemn pronouncements about how different things are and at the same time not. But they are/are not.

I will say that as time passes the facts become more believable because we have assimilated them, but the horror never fades if the events of the day are re-imagined, the evil of the perpetrators confronted, and the lives of the victims revisited.

It is a solemn day and always will be for those who were alive at the time. Let us remember, and teach our children and grandchildren.

[NOTE: I’ve recommended the book Touching History before, but I’ll remind readers that it’s an absolutely riveting account of what happened in the skies that day. Some of it will be a surprise to you.

And here is my own account of 9/11 and my reactions to the event.]

Another day, another “cracker”

The New Neo Posted on by

Another racially-motivated attack in New York City, in full view of an audience:

An attacker pummeled a bus passenger so hard he smashed the bones in his face after calling the victim a “cracker” in Manhattan ”“ marking the second time in two days that people appeared to be randomly targeted in racial tirades against white people, authorities said.

In the latest incident, the suspect passed a 31-year-old rider on the M60 bus riding through Harlem, on West 127th Street, between Amsterdam Avenue and Morningside Drive, around 2:45 p.m., Friday, when he shouted the racial slur and punched the victim in the face, breaking his nose and eye socket, cops said.

I would have thought a group of the witnesses might have jumped the attacker and pummeled him, or at least restrained him. The article gives the following clue as to what actually happened:

Two people who tried to help the victim were also punched but refused medical attention at the scene, law enforcement sources said.

New York, as I have mentioned in previous posts, is a city in which gun laws guarantee that concealed carry is almost nil. So any attackers have the assurance that onlookers are very unlikely to be armed.

This incident appears to resemble another recent one I wrote about previously, in which it seems that the “knockout game” is being played by a single perpetrator with little or no fear of retaliation.

At least this particular attack is being investigated as a hate crime, which it most definitely appears to be. But note that in the NY Post article to which I linked, the races of both perpetrator and the victim are not explicitly mentioned. However, their races are certainly implicit in the story (and there is a photograph of the suspect).

[CORRECTION: A commenter has pointed out that the punching of the two onlookers appears to have occurred in the previous attack, not this most recent one. I have also noticed, on rereading the article, that the investigation as a hate crime also seems to refer to the previous attack.]

The Syria situation segues into bizarro world

The New Neo Posted on by

From the start, President Obama’s confrontation (for want of a better word) with Syria’s Assad was odd, then meandering and contradictory, but always somewhat mysterious.

What was Obama’s goal? Was it just to appear a certain way for political reasons? Or did he think bluster would actually work to cow the Syrian dictator? Or was he in fact intent on actually attacking Assad? Was his underlying message to Assad at all, or was it instead for Iran, or for Russia, or the low information voter, or the international audience, or some or all of the above? Was the whole thing a mostly mindless blunder or a strategic ploy of some sort?

Only the Shadow knows.

But yesterday the situation took a turn for the surreal when John Kerry casually and without much conviction called for Assad to surrender his chemical weapons to an international force and Putin said “Great idea!” I don’t have answers, but I share many of the questions Jeffrey Goldberg poses in this piece.

In addition, I’m with the first commenter to the Goldberg article:

So, throw away the reasons why what is proposed for Syria won´t work, both tactically and politically or what questions to answer to perhaps make the situation better and bring about a solution and just understand that now, today both by ridiculous and irresponsible “diplomatic error” by both Obama and Mr. Kerry, the influence on this issue and the real power now resides in Moscow and Tehran and to a smaller level, Damascus not Washington DC.

This also sets the stage for the real ending of American influence in that region.

Was this the goal all the time? Or did Obama and Kerry just wander into it serendipitously, although guided by their overarching vision of waning American influence in the world and submission to internationalism?

[NOTE: Even the usually Obama-friendly New Republic is skeptical:

Meanwhile, back in Washington, the White House was just as surprised as anyone. Asked if this was a White House plan that Kerry had served up in London, Deputy National Security Advisor Tony Blinken was unequivocal. “No, no, no,” he said. “We literally just heard about this as you did some hours ago.”

So that’s good. At least everyone’s on the same page…

Last night, President Barack Obama, who, just over a week ago, had said he was ready to act, tells the nation’s cable watchers that he’s now discussing this bogus plan with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and that he’s “going to take this very seriously” while also not letting up on the drumbeat of military strikes while. On Tuesday, Syria said it had accepted Russia’s proposal and France said it would seek the UN Security Council’s backing for the proposal.

This, in other words, is no light at the end of the tunnel. This, to borrow a phrase from a Congressional staffer at his wits’ end, “is an unmitigated clusterfuck.”

Please read the whole thing; quite an interesting piece for TNR to have published. The author, Julie Ioffe, seems to think the answer to the “Obama: fool or knave?” question is most “fool.” I think it’s “both,” and have for quite some time.]

[ADDENDUM: Politico—another ordinarily Obama-friendly venue—is likewise critical:

“As soon as I saw Kerry [make his proposal], I said: ”˜He’s in trouble,’” [Lee Gelb of the Council on Foreign Relations] said.

”The Russians saw the opening right away and Syrians saw the opening right away, now [U.S. officials] have got to play this card out,” Gelb said. “I think most people see the Russian and Syrian response as a canard to delay any action and maybe weaken it entirely, but nonetheless you cant now just ignore your own proposal and their acceptance of it.”

“In international politics, it’s all about who takes the initiative,” said Toby Gati, who headed up the State Department’s intelligence bureau under President Bill Clinton.

“The Russians saw this opening ”“ and part of the appeal of the opening for them is to tie down Gulliver ”” that’s us. That’s why I’m concerned that this can turn into a proposal from hell,” she said.

Harsh words from a former Clinton appointee.

Hmmm—former Clinton appointee, former Clinton appointee—one could speculate that perhaps part of the agenda is for Clinton supporters to criticize John Kerry, one of her potential rivals for the Democratic nomination in 2016?]

[ADDENDUM II: More.]

The trouble with John Kerry’s “unbelievably small” comment

The New Neo Posted on by

Here’s what Kerry said:

“We’re not going to war,” Mr. Kerry told reporters Monday after meeting with British Foreign Secretary William Hague in London. “We will be able to hold [Syrian President] Bashar al-Assad accountable without engaging troops on the ground or any other prolonged kind of effort, in a very limited, very targeted, very short-term effort that degrades his capacity to deliver chemical weapons without assuming responsibility for Syria’s civil war. That is exactly what we are talking about doing; an unbelievably small, limited kind of effort.”

Trouble is:

(1) The word “unbelievably” is all too believable. That is: people do not believe what this administration says anymore (or John Kerry, for that matter), and that even includes Obama’s supporters.

(2) Not only is it “unbelievable” because Obama’s and/or Kerry’s veracity is in question, but it’s unbelievable because their judgment is in question. War, and attacks that amount to less than war, is inherently unpredictable, and this administration is foolish if it thinks such a thing can be predicted and strictly limited.

(3) If it’s so unbelievably small, how can it be so very believably effective?

Obama and Syria: words versus deeds

The New Neo Posted on by

I have a new post up at American Thinker entitled “Obama and Syria: Words versus Deeds”:

In trying to puzzle out what might be going on with President Obama’s muddled, non-strategic, and fundamentally “unserious” approach to Syria, it helps to remember that Obama believes that words are as good as deeds, perhaps even better — especially when those words are uttered by Obama. He has concluded that words serve a convincing purpose in the moment, that one utterance does not have to be consistent with the next to be credible and serve that purpose, and that none of it has to be followed up with action to be effective.

And why wouldn’t he? Words have gotten him to the pinnacle of the US presidency without deeds ever having been necessary…

Lobsters and longevity: who knew?

The New Neo Posted on by

Here’s an article entitled “Lobsters may hold the key to eternal life.”

I don’t know that “eternal” is quite the right word for it. But certainly “very long” would seem to fit.

Apparently it’s all in the telomeres:

Although they are still susceptible to death by disease or attacks, lobsters can theoretically live forever because getting older does not raise their chance of dying.

An enzyme known as telomerase prevents the DNA in lobsters’ cells from being damaged as they are replicated, scientist Simon Watt reports in The Sun.

Does that make you feel more guilty about eating lobster? Or does it make you feel better about it?

On small breasts

The New Neo Posted on by

NOTE: I thought everyone might enjoy a break from politics and world events, and so I’m recycling the following old post with some minor updating.]

In an effort to boost my traffic, I am writing about breasts today.

Small breasts. But breasts nonetheless

As did the NY Times a few years ago, in a piece about a new trend: lingerie stores that cater to and celebrate the less-endowed woman.

I’ll keep a respectful silence about my own particular form; that much traffic I’m not seeking. But back when I was a dancer, I observed that small-breasted women had it kind of good, at least in the ballet and fashion world. Their bodies created a better line for both dance and the display of fashionable clothing.

And I never understood the later trend towards implants, especially of the perfectly round variety, a shape that does not exist in nature for the human female breast but has since become a standard of sorts. After viewing enough of these orange- or grapefruit-like objects in catalogs such as Victoria’s Secret which purport to show the ideal female body, the unreal becomes the sought-after, although it is unobtainable except through surgery.

Men being men, there’s a certain tendency I’ve noticed for them to consider larger breasts better—at least, up to a point (pun intended). But men also being men, there’s a certain tendency I’ve also noticed for them to consider a pretty wide range of possibilities more-than-acceptable for the desirable female form.

And speaking of wide ranges, there is actually a website dedicated to photos of unenhanced, non-surgically-altered female breasts. It’s not meant to be prurient, although some might certainly find it so. It’s meant to demonstrate to girls growing up in the age of the ubiquitous implant what a natural breast actually looks like, so they don’t get the idea that theirs are abnormal. That’s what it’s come to.

[NOTE: You might enjoy Nora Ephron’s comic 1975 meditation on her own small-breast woes. I especially love this sentence; a perfect description of the bathing suits I recall from the late 50s and early 60s:

That was the era when you could lay an uninhabited bathing suit on the beach and someone would make a pass at it.]

Don’t sit on a hot stove…

The New Neo Posted on by

…till President Obama weighs in on this case:

A man allegedly went on a rampage in Union Square on Wednesday afternoon and left a complete stranger brain-dead in the process.

Police said that the attack may have been a hate crime.

Friends of Jeffrey Babbitt, 62, were shocked to hear about the random act of violence that left the gentle, retired train conductor in a coma, CBS 2”²s Dave Carlin reported on Friday…

Babbitt was minding his own business as he walked through the crowd near the chess boards in Union Square when a man made a hateful announcement and began his rampage, witnesses said.

“He said ”˜the next white person who walks by I’m going to [expletive],’” one woman said. “His fist went in and the man’s head bobbed and he hit the ground and you could hear his skull hitting the ground.”

The man continued his rampage before demanding to see police officers.

“He stood there and hit two more people and asked for the police to come,” Michael Benson said.

Stunned witnesses counted a total of three people attacked. The suspect, Lashawn Marten, 31, remained at the scene until police arrived.

Sounds like a variation on the “knockout game,” except that in this version the perp had a few more years on him than is usual, and he was going solo rather than being part of a group competition. Otherwise the m.o. is similar to that of the knockout game, as is the choice of victim: an older white person.

The knockout game isn’t all that common, fortunately. But even one case would be one too many. Here’s a description of a St. Louis, Missouri version of the phenomenon:

They created a game. The objective was to knock out a stranger with a single punch, get them off their feet. Stealing a wallet or cellphone was not the point. “Do the lick,” in Eisele’s words, and get on with it…

They flaunted their TKO status on Facebook. They sought out other kids to join their nascent gang. They taught recruits to pick vulnerable, older adults. One rule was that a TKO member had to witness the assault, “kinda like a performance evaluation,” Eisele recalls.

Police are described as baffled, because the motive is so unconventional. But I don’t know why they’re baffled. Thug and gang culture glorifies violence for violence’s sake, and Facebook gives youths a venue for bragging about it. The juvenile justice system (as you will see if you read the article about the St. Louis situation) gives the perpetrators the sense that, if they are underage, they will get a mere slap on the wrist if caught. The Zimmerman case—and yes, our president’s comments about it—have heightened black anger at whites, and have probably made people even more reluctant to defend themselves for fear of becoming a George-Zimmerman-type pariah. What’s more, the method of attack, which takes the victims by surprise, makes it unlikely they would have enough time and warning to strike back, and in cities such as New York the perpetrators know that spectators are almost certainly unarmed.

Coming soon to an Amazon near you: the Kindle Paperwhite

The New Neo Posted on by

The Kindle Paperwhite is coming out on September 30, and although I don’t know that it’s “the best device for reading, period,” as the ad claims, it seems like a pretty nifty gadget nonetheless. As this reviewer says, it represents an improvement over an already-good product.

The Paperwhite is available for pre-order, and (here comes the pitch, of course) if you want to buy one you can click on the above link or on any of my Amazon widgets—pretty please!—so I can get a cut of the action.

I cannot tell a lie; I don’t use one. I’m a bookish Luddite. But I’ve often thought that, when my chronic arm injuries were at their worst and I had great difficulty holding a book and turning pages (I still am reluctant to hold a book for very long in the conventional way; I prop it up on a countertop or table when I read), a Kindle would have been absolutely wonderful.

Samantha Power’s obtuseness about Iran is no surprise

The New Neo Posted on by

Our highly-credentialed UN Ambassador Samantha Power either believed, or pretended to believe, that Iran and/or Russia would be cowed by the international community’s revelations about and reaction to Syria, and would be convinced to turn on Assad as a result:

“We worked with the UN to create a group of inspectors and then worked for more than six months to get them access to the country on the logic that perhaps the presence of an investigative team in the country might deter future attacks,” Power said at the Center for American Progress as she made the case for intervening in Syria.

“Or, if not, at a minimum, we thought perhaps a shared evidentiary base could convince Russia or Iran ”” itself a victim of Saddam Hussein’s monstrous chemical weapons attacks in 1987-1988 ”” to cast loose a regime that was gassing it’s people,” she said.

This is—well, I’m not sure I can come up with an adjective, or even a string of adjectives, that describes it. Stupid? Delusional? Naive? And yet, completely unsurprising, if you know much about Samantha Power.

One of the worst things about the Obama administration is not just Obama and his own beliefs and policies, but the kindred spirits and/or mediocrities he has appointed to high places. I’m not talking about just one or two or three people, either; it’s pretty much a clean sweep. One subgroup of simpatico appointees is composed of people who tend to be (like him) academics with lofty notions about how the world works and their own power to persuade. Perhaps there’s something about academic life that leads to this sort of thing, or perhaps a great many of those who choose that life in the first place are of that ilk. But Obama seems to have a special gift for selecting them.

Samantha Power is a classic example. As I noted three months ago:

Power has a long record of supporting [Obama’s] foreign policy, is a fellow graduate of Harvard Law School, and is married to well-known leftist law professor Cass Sunstein. In an interesting twist, Power (like another close Obama adviser, Valerie Jarrett) was born outside the U.S. ”” in Power’s case, in Ireland to non-citizen parents who emigrated to the U.S. when Power was nine (Jarrett”˜s parents were expat Americans in Iran during her early childhood)…

Power has what one might call a western European sensibility and attitude toward the U.S. That outlook is hardly limited to Europe, of course; it’s one that is also rampant among most of the American left. What’s more, it seems to be shared by Obama himself ”” although for political reasons he has rarely articulated it quite as fully and clearly as Power ”” the conviction that the U.S. has blood on its hands and that we, like the Germans after WWII, must go on bended knee in order to achieve a similar catharsis.

Power is in her early forties, and until the start of her affiliation with Barack Obama (beginning in 2005 and continuing till now with only a brief hiatus when she had to step down from his 2008 campaign for calling Hilary Clinton a “monster”) she had been an academic and author/journalist. Her specialty was genocide, and she spent a great deal of time and effort opining on what should be done about such killings, as well as similar but less comprehensive atrocities (the gassing of civilians in Syria would no doubt qualify).

Well, now she gets the chance to put her ideas into action. And if her assumptions about Iran and Russia are any indication, it appears that, in addition to her stellar academic career, she (and we) may be about to get some instruction from the school of hard knocks.