Prediction on next “change” post

The New Neo Posted on by

Update: I am currently at work on my next “change” post, and hope to finish it in the next day or two.

But I’ve been wrong in those predictions before. The best-laid-schemes and all that, as the poet says:

But Mousie, thou are no thy-lane,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men,
Gang aft agley,
An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,
For promis’d joy!

Still, thou art blest, compar’d wi’ me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But Och! I backward cast my e’e,
On prospects drear!
An’ forward, tho’ I canna see,
I guess an’ fear!

Language Arts 101, by Mr. Jaspan

The New Neo Posted on by

We bloggers do love to pick on journalists. But can you blame us? They so often serve up such tempting food for the picking.

Michael Totten has a post about one Andrew Jaspan, who is quoted as saying something so mind-bogglingly absurdly stupendously gobsmackingly stupid that at first I had trouble accepting that I wasn’t reading the Onion. Here’s an excerpt:

Jaspan is the editor-in-chief at Melbourne’s The Age. Seems he was a bit offended when his fellow Australian Douglas Wood said the guys who kidnapped him in Iraq are “assholes.”

[Jaspan quote:] “I was, I have to say, shocked by Douglas Wood’s use of the a—hole word, if I can put it like that, which I just thought was coarse and very ill-thought through and I think demeans the man and is one of the reasons why people are slightly sceptical of his motives and everything else. The issue really is largely, speaking as I understand it, he was treated well there. He says he was fed every day, and as such to turn around and use that kind of language I think is just insensitive.”

I became interested in learning more about Mr. Jaspan. Let me just say that Google is a glorious thing, and a very quick perusal revealed a few interesting facts.

First of all, I had found it difficult, if not impossible, to believe that an Australian could be so–well, so prissy about language. Well, my notion of Australians can remain intact, because I was relieved to discover that Jaspan is no Australian. He seems to be English (or perhaps Scottish; it’s a bit unclear, and I got tired of trying to find out). See this article, written a year ago when Jaspan worked for the Sunday Herald in Scotland and was being considered for the post at The Age–apparently, Jaspan gets around:

Surely you can’t be serious that Fairfax management is looking to hire Andrew Jaspan? The editor of five papers in 10 years before being fired from The Observer and landing at The Sunday Herald in Scotland. When his name was first mentioned serious observers of British newspapers such as myself, and those of us with high hopes for a revival at The Age, thought it was a quaint way of showing that the search for a new editor would be global. Has Fairfax done its homework or has it been swayed by Jaspan’s well-known ability to talk the talk?

The article goes on to describe certain eccentricities of Jaspan’s, including his editorial policy of “design-over-content,” which certainly seems consistent with Jaspan’s remarks about Wood and his captors. However, also in light of those comments, I found the following to be most interesting indeed (quoted from a Scottish columnist named Terry Murden):

I recall one meeting with Jaspan when he described a critical profile of him in The Sunday Times Scotland as a ”shitty piece of journalism.”

Oh dear oh dear, Mr. Jaspan–such language! But of course I would imagine those profiling him in The Sunday Times Scotland were a lot crueler than Douglas Wood’s kidnappers.

The Left’s plan for Iraq: Vietnam is the template

The New Neo Posted on by

Why is Jane Fonda still hated? And why am I bringing this old subject up now?

Well, it’s connected with the process of thinking about my “A mind is a difficult thing…” series once again. It’s also connected to a passage I read in David Horowitz’s Radical Son, a book which has to go back to the library soon if I don’t want my library fines to reach epic proportions. And it’s related to this column by Quang X. Pham that appeared in today’s Boston Globe.

Fonda’s offenses were not limited to her Hanoi trip, although that’s the focus of most of the more recent publicity about her. But it’s her (and ex-husband Tom Hayden’s) other activities against the Vietnam war that interest me now, in light of what’s happening politically in this country concerning reports of dwindling support for our efforts in Iraq.

Our pullout from South Vietnam, and then our withdrawal of financial support to the struggling ARVN (arguably, a far greater betrayal), and that country’s subsequent Communist fall thirty years ago as well as subsequent bloody events in Cambodia, still rankle and fester, providing food for countless arguments. Who was at fault, and why did it happen?

One cannot underestimate the power of public opinion in this country, and it is an indisputable fact that those on the left were instrumental in shaping that opinion. In this post, I discussed how and why it was that so many on the anti-Vietnam War left still refuse to acknowledge the effect their activities had, post-Vietnam War, on the people of Vietnam and Cambodia. What I didn’t describe in that post was how far some of them–such as, for example, the prominent pair Jane Fonda and Tom Hayden–actually went in their antiwar activities. They were not simply protestors; they were (there’s no other way to put this) active lobbyists for the enemy cause, and polished and successful ones at that.

Fonda’s recent apology (or re-apology) doesn’t even begin to address the subject. And in fact, most of the critiques of her activities focus on her over-the-top behavior during her 1972 Hanoi trip. In my opinion, terrible though her actions there may have been, they didn’t really matter as much to American policy as her subsequent domestic lobbying activities, as detailed by Horowitz in Radical Son:

Hayden and Fonda organized an “Indo-China Peace Campaign” to cut off remaining American support for the regimes in Cambodia and South Vietnam. For the next few years [the early 70s], the Campaign worked tirelessly to ensure the victory of the North Vietnamese Communists and the Khmer Rouge. Accompanied by a camera team, Hayden and Fonda traveled first to Hanoi and then to the “liberated” zones in South Vietnam, to make a propaganda film. Called “Introduction to the Enemy,” it attempted to persuade viewers that the Communists were going to create a new society in the south. Equality and justice awaited its inhabitants if only American would cut off support for the Saigon regime.

Assisted by radical legislators like Ron Dellums and Bella Abzug, Hayden set up a caucus in the Capitol, where he lectured congressional staffers on the need to end American aid. He directed his attention to Cambodia as well, lobbying for an accommodation with the Khmer Rouge guerillas. Nixon’s resignation over Watergate provided all the leverage Hayden and his activists needed. The Democrats won the midterm elections, bringing to Washington a new group of legislators determined to undermine the settlement that Nixon and Kissinger had achieved. The aid was cut, the Saigon regime fell, and the Khmer rouge marched into the Cambodian capital. In the two years that followed, more Indochinese were killed by the victorious Communists than had been killed on both sides in all thirteen years of the anti-Communist war.

It was the bloodbath that [the Left’s] opponents had predicted. But for the Left there would be no contrition and no look back.

Quang X. Pham’s Globe column is about the American betrayal of people such as his own father, a South Vietnamese officer and pilot trained in the late 50s in the US, who ended up imprisoned for a decade after the North Vietnamese takeover. He ends his article with the following poignant question: Now talk of exiting the war in Iraq has increased. What will happen to the Iraqis who believed in us? Will we let them down too?

Iraq is not Vietnam. But it appears more and more that the left is trying to make it into Vietnam. Jane Fonda is no longer especially active, although every now and then she makes some general statement against the war in Iraq. Hayden, likewise, is no longer the mover and shaker he once was. (Some of the more powerful antiwar cast of characters, however, are identical then and now–but that’s another story for another post).

But when I read the following words about the Iraq war by Tom Hayden, I got the proverbial chill down my spine. If he’s not as powerful as he used to me, it’s not for lack of desire or lack of ideas. The man has a plan, and his plan–strangely enough–is to repeat what worked for him back in the early 70’s:

…the [Leftist anti-Iraq war] movement needs to force our government to exit. The strategy must be to deny the U.S. occupation funding, political standing, sufficient troops, and alliances necessary to their strategy for dominance.

The first step is to build pressure at congressional district levels to oppose any further funding or additional troops for war. If members of Congress balk at cutting off all assistance and want to propose “conditions” for further aid, it is a small step toward threatening funding. If only 75 members of Congress go on record against any further funding, that’s a step in the right direction ”“ towards the exit.

The important thing is for anti-war activists to become more grounded in the everyday political life of their districts, organizing anti-war coalitions including clergy, labor and inner city representatives to knock loudly on congressional doors and demand that the $200 billion squandered on Iraq go to infrastructure and schools at home. When trapped between imperial elites and their own insistent constituents, members of Congress will tend to side with their voters. That is how the wars in Vietnam and Cambodia were ended in 1975.

So there it is, in black and white–the plan is to repeat the glory days that led to the boat people and the killing fields of Cambodia. Pressure Congress to stop the funding, just as in 1975.

It is really, really recommended that you read Hayden’s entire document, in order to get a flavor of the unrepentant and unchanged quality of his thought processes and strategies. Just as in the 70s the Left undermined the idea of Vietnamization, Hayden is determined to undermine plans for Iraqization:

…we need to defeat the U.S. strategy of “Iraqization.” “Clearly, it’s better for us if they’re in the front-line,” Paul Wolfowitz explained last February. This cynical strategy is based on putting an Iraqi “face” on the U.S. occupation in order to reduce the number of American casualties, neutralize opposition in other Arab countries, and slowly legitimize the puppet regime. In truth, it means changing the color of the body count.

Note that one of the rationales for opposing Iraqization is the idea that it’s based on a sinister and cynical racist exploitation of the Iraqis, rather than their empowerment and the need for the US to ultimately bow out when no longer needed.

There is no sign, aside from Pentagon spin, that an Iraqi force can replace the American occupation in the foreseeable future. Pressure for funding cuts and for an early American troop withdrawal will expose the emptiness of the promise of “Iraqization.” In Vietnam, the end quickly came when South Vietnamese troops were expected to defend their country. The same is likely to occur in Iraq …

Not if we have anything to say about it, Tom.

(Linked to Mudville Gazette’s “Open Post.”)

New neuro-con on the block

The New Neo Posted on by

With a name like “Neuro-con,” how could I not pay attention? He or she (I don’t really know which at this point) is a new blogger who has chosen to remain anonymous for this reason.

Neuro-con is a conservative with a PhD. in psychology, working in the field of neuroscience research. I don’t know whether Neuro-con is also a neocon–much less a neo-neocon–but I welcome Neuro’s expertise in the field of research, as well as his/her stylish writing. (Neuro, please, are you a man or are you a woman, so I can quit this tedious he/she business already?)

See Neuro’s take on that NY Times article about politics being at least partly genetic. I wrote about the topic briefly here, but Neuro has read both the Times article and the original research on which it was based, and therefore has some very interesting observations to add. Neuro also seems to be starting up what looks to be a series of posts on the topic of the politics of genetics.

Welcome, Neuro, to that small but stalwart group: the psycho-bloggers.

Neo-neocon’s handy guide to northern New Englanders (Part II: signage)

The New Neo Posted on by

I thought of an additional New England phenomenon, one I neglected to mention in my recent post on the subject.

Call it Fact F. It can be summarized as, “if you need to ask, you shouldn’t be here.”

It’s roughly connected to Fact C, “If you weren’t born here, forget about it,” but it has a somewhat different flavor. I’ll give you some examples of the way it operates.

Recently I was driving on a turnpike in New Hampshire (yes, there are a couple) when I came to a tollbooth with three “exact change only” booths, and only one booth with a toll collector of whom one might ask a question. And yet nowhere, absolutely nowhere, was there a sign informing the driver of the amount of the toll to be collected here. Not on the approach, not above the booths, not on the basket into which you dropped the money, nowhere.

In Maine, the is another toll road. It’s called, logically enough, the Maine Turnpike. They are better there at posting the tolls; the turnpike even has EZ passes now (a system for which New Hampshire is still gearing up). But the Maine Turnpike has its own problems. It has signs, yes, but some exhibit what I call passive-aggressive signage–that is, they tell the unsuspecting tourist (on whom Maine’s economy more or less depends) to go the wrong way–the longer way, or the way with the higher toll.

Then there is the northern New England minimalism about the street sign in general. Boston is typical in this regard. Although it’s a great city to visit (just don’t take your car), it’s renowned for convoluted roads and terrible traffic. There are signs on almost all the side streets, even the little bitty inconsequential ones, but many main streets lack them. It is assumed that everyone knows the main streets and only needs help with the more obscure ones. So the non-resident has the strange experience of being able to drive and drive and drive for many miles along huge thoroughfares, looking vainly at every street corner for a clue as to what street he/she might be on. I believe that, were a study to be done, about 25% of Boston traffic at any one time would consist of just such people (in the fall, when college begins, it would probably be closer to 75%).

The situation would be bad enough if Boston streets ran parallel to each other. But they most decidedly do not; they crisscross constantly in alarming fashion. This makes it difficult, even if one is on a main street like Beacon or Commonwealth, to actually stay on that street, or to follow directions, if one should be lucky enough to have some (or wimpy enough to ask—it does no good, believe me). There is that moment of truth when the traffic all comes together in one big unregulated mishmash (typically, there are no traffic lights at these free-for-alls), and you have to make your choice minus any guidance at all—and then drive on, vainly looking for proof that this still is Beacon Street, mile after signless mile.

But we love it.

More Bush mansions

The New Neo Posted on by

Dean Esmay has kindly linked to my post about Bush “mansions,” privilege, (extreme or otherwise), and family political dynasties. In his link, he also kindly offered to post the photo of the other Bush “mansion” if I send it to him, since he is aware of my posto-photo-phobia.

Thanks, Dean! But I figure it’s time for me to try to end this damsel in distress thing, bite the bullet, and tackle the task.

So here, for your viewing pleasure, is the home (actually, it’s a townhouse with minimal yard area) in which GW and Laura lived when they began married life in Midland. My informant, once again, is Pancho of Midland, Texas.


Posted by Hello

Well, that wasn’t so very hard. Maybe I’ll try it more often.

The failed suicide bomber and the “kitchen accident”

The New Neo Posted on by

This is my question: was her “kitchen accident” an accident?

Suicide bombers are a bizarre and deeply upsetting phenomenon, even in their “ordinary” manifestations (although there is absolutely nothing ordinary about the suicide bombings).

But this latest suicide bomber–or attempted suicide bomber, because fortunately this woman succeeded in neither blowing herself up nor in destroying anyone else in the process–is in the realm of the exceptionally strange. She is in line with the latest trend in suicide bombing, which seems to run in the direction of commandeering the halt and the lame, the damaged and/or the mentally ill, to be pawns (willing? unwilling?) in the terrorists’ schemes.

It is hard to know the truth about this woman. This is the story as it has emerged so far: she had been engaged to be married, was burned in a kitchen accident, and treated in an Israeli hospital. Her fiance then rejected her, and she was caught in the act of returning to try to blow up those who had saved her, along with whatever other innocents might happen to be around at the time. There is dramatic video of the actual moments of her failure-to-detonate, and the reports are that she told contradictory accounts during her interrogation.

Perhaps with time this story will be sorted out; perhaps not. Perhaps it even will be forgotten rather quickly, as so many are–after all, no one was killed, or even hurt. I don’t know whether we’ll ever find out the truth. But I am especially suspicious of some of the details of this story.

The following is just a theory, and may be very farfetched. It’s based on nothing but a hunch, and a tentative one at that. But the thought that occurred to me when I first read that the would-be suicide bomber, Wafa al-Biss, had suffered severe burns in a kitchen accident five months ago was whether this had indeed been an accident at all.

The “kitchen accident” is a commonplace occurrence, and no accident, among women in the third world, particularly in Afghanistan and in India. Sometimes it represents a suicide attempt (more likely in Afghanistan), while sometimes it is homicide with a financial motive involving dowries (the situation in India). Here’s an article to read on the Afghan situation, and here’s another on what tends to happen in India.

I don’t think it’s a common phenomenon among the Palestinians, however, or in the Arab world in general (although, apparently, as you will find if you Google “dowries Arab,” the dowry does seem to exist in Arab countries). But it’s the so-called “honor killing” that is prevalent in the Arab world, although I’m not sure whether “cooking accident” is ever the method of choice.

Something about this particular case makes me wonder. Is someone trying to murder this woman–first directly, in the “accident,” and later indirectly, by forcing her to become a suicide bomber? Or was her “kitchen accident” really a botched suicide, and this checkpoint event a ghastly attempt of hers to finish the job and become a martyr to boot?

In the photos, this woman seems hysterical. In the interrogation, likewise. Is this a case of the sickness of Palestinian society, with its glorification of the grisly suicide bomber, giving an already-suicidal woman an opportunity to make her death “mean something” by murdering others? Or is it something even more macabre, if such a thing be possible, a double attempt to murder her, and get a “twofer” by making her a suicide bomber?

Or perhaps she’s just the “ordinary” suicide bomber, after all.

Karl Rove: all he needs is an editor and some qualifiers

The New Neo Posted on by

It’s simple–Karl Rove just needs an editor.

Democrats and liberals are in an uproar about some statements Rove made Wednesday at a Manhattan fund-raiser. In case you were on planet Xenon and missed them, here they are:

Conservatives saw the savagery of 9/11 and the attacks and prepared for war; liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers. Conservatives saw what happened to us on 9/11 and said, “We will defeat our enemies.” Liberals saw what happened to us and said, “We must understand our enemies.”

Well, it’s not quite up there with comparing the US military guards at Guantanamo to Nazis. But I may finally be able to prove my former-liberal bona fides (and to anger some on the right) by saying that I can understand at least some of the Democrats’ upset.

First let me say that a great deal of this Democratic outrage, particularly among politicians, was no doubt self-serving strategic, histrionic tit-for-tat for the flak Rebublicans made over Durbin’s recent remarks. Even the NY Times article indicates as much:

On Thursday, Democrats seized on Mr. Rove’s comments, clearly hoping to put Republicans on the defensive by issuing harsh criticisms throughout the day in press releases, at a hastily arranged news conferences in the Capitol and in remarks delivered on the Senate floor.

But some of the Democrat anger at Rove’s remarks was probably genuine, especially among rank and file. What was the problem? The statement was a sweeping generalization that offended many liberals who had in fact been angered by 9/11 when it happened, were harmed and scarred by it (think of all those liberals in New York, for example), and who disagree with Bush because they don’t think his approach is the best way to fight terrorism, and not because they are interested in “understanding” the attackers. Such liberals do indeed exist, although how numerous they are I have no way of knowing.

So I hereby humbly offer myself as Rove’s new speechwriter, or at least his editor. Here is my revision of his words, complete with qualifiers that make it a simple truth, albeit a somewhat less hard-hitting statement:

Conservatives saw the savagery of 9/11and the attacks and prepared for war; some liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers. Conservatives saw what happened to us on 9/11 and said, “We will defeat our enemies.” Some liberals saw what happened to us and said, “We must understand our enemies.”

The word “some” can work wonders. Even the word “many” would have helped.

Or, substitute the word “leftists” for “liberals,” and make the qualifier “most.” Then it would all be fine. Or somewhat fine. Perhaps.

Non-news of the day

The New Neo Posted on by

Non-news of the day: the majority of Americans oppose reinstating the draft, by a margin of about 2.5 to 1. Surprise, surprise!

The AP article also reports that “over half” of Americans would discourage a son from joining the military right now, and two-thirds would discourage a daughter. The poll results are tied in to evidence that the war in Iraq is losing support in this country, and the failure to meet military recruiting goals.

That is certainly no surprise, either. As the war wears on, particularly as it is portrayed in the press with the emphasis on the negative, how could it be otherwise? Even if the media were more positive about the Iraq war, I would imagine that most parents wouldn’t be eager to have their children race over there. The most important data, though, is missing from the article, and that is: how does this compare to previous years? How many people ordinarily say they would encourage sons/daughters to enlist?

I haven’t a clue, and we’re not given one from the AP article, despite the spin that ties these results into dissatisfaction with the war. I would love to actually have a sentence or two comparing results of this poll to previous ones, which wouldn’t seem to be too much to ask, and would give the reader the chance to judge for him/herself.

Also, it would be nice to have the actual figure as to how many would discourage a son from joining up, rather than the general “over half.” That covers a pretty wide range: from 51% all the way to 100%. Somehow, methinks it’s closer to the former than the latter. But again, it would be helpful to know.

ADDENDUM: Finally found a story that answers the latter question, in Newsday. The answer: 55% would discourage a son from enlisting now. Not so very high, considering. The more surprising figure is that 32% would encourage a son to enlist at the present time.

But now I’d like some more information: what percentage of each category actually have sons of about the right age to enlist? That would be an interesting statistic; perhaps there would be differences, perhaps not. And perhaps some of us could do a better job at designing these poll questions.

By the way, I’m not being critical of anyone here–except, of course, the pollsters and the AP. One can indeed support a war without being eager to have one’s child fight it, just as one can support a police and fire department, or search and rescue team, without wanting to encourage one’s child to join up. I wouldn’t expect most parents to be active in pushing a child into the line of fire, like those Spartan mothers who told their sons to come back with their shields or on them. What’s far more important is whether a person supports a child who does decide to join up.

(Link to Mudville Gazette open post.)

Political genetics? Zell has the final word

The New Neo Posted on by

On June 21, the NY Times published this article headlined, “Some politics may be etched in the genes.”

Wow, I thought. What are neocons, genetic mosaics?

However, it turns out the research was more about concepts that influence politics than about political affiliation itself. Here’s an excerpt:

…on the basis of a new study, a team of political scientists is arguing that people’s gut-level reaction to issues like the death penalty, taxes and abortion is strongly influenced by genetic inheritance…

From an extensive battery of surveys on personality traits, religious beliefs and other psychological factors, the researchers selected 28 questions most relevant to political behavior. The questions asked people “to please indicate whether or not you agree with each topic,” or are uncertain on issues like property taxes, capitalism, unions and X-rated movies…

The researchers then compared dizygotic or fraternal twins, who, like any biological siblings, share 50 percent of their genes, with monozygotic, or identical, twins, who share 100 percent of their genes.

Calculating how often identical twins agree on an issue and subtracting the rate at which fraternal twins agree on the same item provides a rough measure of genes’ influence on that attitude. A shared family environment for twins reared together is assumed…

On school prayer, for example, the identical twins’ opinions correlated at a rate of 0.66, a measure of how often they agreed. The correlation rate for fraternal twins was 0.46. This translated into a 41 percent contribution from inheritance…

But after correcting for the tendency of politically like-minded men and women to marry each other, the researchers also found that the twins’ self-identification as Republican or Democrat was far more dependent on environmental factors like upbringing and life experience than was their social orientation, which the researchers call ideology. Inheritance accounted for 14 percent of the difference in party, the researchers found.

Here’s the part that starts being relevant to what’s going on with neocons (perhaps):

A mismatch between an inherited social orientation and a given party may also explain why some people defect from a party. Many people who are genetically conservative may be brought up as Democrats, and some who are genetically more progressive may be raised as Republicans, the researchers say.

In tracking attitudes over the years, geneticists have found that social attitudes tend to stabilize in the late teens and early 20’s, when young people begin to fend for themselves.

Some “mismatched” people remain loyal to their family’s political party. But circumstances can override inherited bent. The draft may look like a good idea until your number is up. The death penalty may seem barbaric until a loved one is murdered.

That’s quite simplistic, but it’s a version of the old “mugged by reality” line about neocons (one I’ve been guilty of using, although in retrospect I think it’s glibly misleading, as further segments of my “change” series should wind up demonstrating. The true situation is far more complex.)

But here’s my very favorite part. I’m with Zell Miller on this one, although I wish I could say it as well as he does:

Other people whose social orientations are out of line with their given parties may feel a discomfort that can turn them into opponents of their former party, Dr. Alford said.

“Zell Miller would be a good example of this,” Dr. Alford said, referring to the former Democratic governor and senator from Georgia who gave an impassioned speech at the Republican National Convention last year against the Democrats’ nominee, John Kerry.

Support for Democrats among white men has been eroding for years in the South, Dr. Alford said, and Mr. Miller is remarkable for remaining nominally a Democrat despite his divergence from the party line on many issues.

Reached by telephone, Mr. Miller said he did not see it quite that way. He said that his views had not changed much since his days as a marine, but that the Democratic Party had moved.

“And I’m not talking about inch by inch, like a glacier,” said Mr. Miller, who makes the case in a new book, “A Deficit of Decency.” “I’m saying the thing got up and flew away.”

My sentiments exactly. The blasted thing just got up and flew away.