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| 5/25 |
| 2002/5/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Israel] UID:24781 Activity:very high |
5/9 "Why Don't I Care About the Palestinians?"
http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/680667/posts
"The Closed Circle: An Interpretation of the Arabs"
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/detail/-/books/1566634407/customer-
reviews/ref=as_pt/103-2659247-3789407
\_ hey free republic guy, that article was even dumber
than the usual crap you link to in the motd, are
you ok? sign your name someday, we'll make you meatloaf
and cheer you up. - danh
\_ Defend your point.
\_ Dan doesn't need to defend his point. He's a leftist. That
just makes him magically right when he says you're dumb. I
read the article expecting some ridiculous freeper rant but
it actually makes sense. The arab world has produced nothing
of value economically, culturally, or in any other way in a
few hundred years. The palestinians have the double curse of
being under UN run 'camps' and being hated by their 'brother'
arabs for 50+ years who use them as a pawn against Israel.
But Dan says freeper = bad, thus it must be so.
\_ I dunno: I'd say we value the oil that
all the Arabs produce quite a bit.
\_ Uh the arabs didn't produce the oil in the sense
of doing anything. They sit on it and europeans
and Americans come in and do everything and pay
them some money for access. This is hardly a
huge cultural or economic achievement to be
proud of. Anyway, their heyday is over. Saudi
Arabia's infrastructure was never really built
up properly during their big time and now they're
fucked. When the oil runs out or we switch to
other fuels over the next 30 years, then what?
Back to eating sand and reading the Koran and
hating those evil Americans and Europeans who
'epxloited' them.
\_ do i get free food if i post a link to a dumb editorial
also? -!op
\_ This is only worth a "see the above reply about Dan"
\_ http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/001/161yaihr.asp |
| 5/25 |
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| freerepublic.com/focus/news/680667/posts David Pryce-Jones, who knows the Arabs better than anyone). Shouldn't I have some Christian compassion to spare for the poor suffering Palestinians? Well, I suppose I should, but to be honest about it, I don't. I am aware of a certain level of compassion fatigue in regard to the world at large, and it spills over into the Palestinian issue. The other day I had the depressing experience of reading, one right after the other, Stephen Kotkin's wonderfully titled "Trashcanistan" in the April 15th New Republic, then Helen Epstein's "Mozambique: In Search of the Hidden Cause of AIDS" in the May 9th New York Review of Books. The second tries to discover why a sleepy rural area of Mozambique, populated by courteous folk practicing a traditional way of life, has high levels of AIDS. Kotkin's account of the ex-Soviet colonies -- Ukraine, Moldova, the central Asian and Caucasian republics, etc. Principal features of the landscape here are utter economic collapse, "gangland violence among state ministers," rising Islamofascism and the flight of large sectors of the population. I have just been reading another report about that wretched country. The women left behind survive as best they can, often by becoming the mistresses of the few local men who can actually afford to eat. Because Mozambique has been wrecked by corruption, tribal war and stupid economics. You can only read a certain amount of this stuff before you start to avert your eyes. All the simple explanations for the horrors that stain a large part of our planet have been used up. We now know that it's not the fault of colonialism, or neo-colonialism, or capitalism, or socialism. They can't handle modernity, for some cultural reason we don't understand and can't do anything about. Look at the last 50-odd years, since the colonial powers left. Where in the Arab world is there a trace or a spark of democracy? There are at least two recent Nobel prizes with Arab names attached. Collectively, though, as nations, the Arabs are no-hopers. I spent some of my formative years in Hong Kong, a barren piece of rock with zero natural resources, under foreign occupation, chock-full of refugees from the Mao tyranny. The people there weren't lounging in UNRWA camps or making suicide runs at the governor's mansion. They were trading, building, speculating, manufacturing, working -- with the result that Hong Kong is now a glittering modern city filled with well-dressed, well-educated, well-fed people, proud of what they have accomplished together, and with a higher standard of living than Britain herself. If, following the Oslo accords -- or for that matter, in the 20 years of Jordanian occupation -- the Palestinians had taken that route, had set aside their fantasies of revenge and massacre, and concentrated on building up something worth having, I might have respect for them. The only halfway sympathetic thing I can find to say about the Palestinians is that UNRWA has surely been part of the problem. The number of people UNRWA cares for has gone from 600,000 in 1948 to nearly four million today. Now, I understand that the prime impulse of bureaucracies, especially welfare bureaucracies, is the consolidation and expansion of their turf, and a steady increase in the number of their "clients"; The good people of Hong Kong should go down on their knees every night and thank God that there was no UNRWA in the colony in 1949. So, come to think of it, should the German and East European refugees who flooded into Western Europe after WWII. Everywhere you look around the Arab world you see squalor, despotism, cruelty, and hopelessness. The best they have been able to manage, politically speaking, has been the Latin-American style one-party kleptocracies of Egypt and Jordan. Those are the peaks of Arab political achievement under independence, under government by their own people. The norm is just gangsterism, with thugs like Assad, Qaddafi, or Saddam in charge. It doesn't seem to be anything to do with religion: the secular states (Iraq, Syria) are just as horrible as the religious ones like Saudi Arabia. We are all supposed to support the notion of a Palestinian state. Why should we wish for another gangster-satrapy to be added to the Arab roll of shame, busy manufacturing terrorists to come here and slaughter Americans in their offices? What, actually, are the possible futures for the Palestinians? An independent state, under Arafat or someone just as thuggish. Expulsion from the West Bank and Gaza, those territories then incorporated into Israel. As I have already indicated, I don't want it, and I can't see why anyone else would, either. Except Palestinians, I suppose: If they yearn to be ruled by amoral hoodlums (as, according to polls, they apparently do), I suppose they have some theoretical right to see their wishes fulfilled -- but why should the rest of us allow it to happen, given the dangers to us? Number 2 might work for a time, but the Israelis would eventually get fed up with it, and then we'd move on to one of the other options. Number 3 would get us back to the pseudo-stability of pre-1967, but is deeply unpopular with Jordanians -- and look what happened in 1967! Number 4 undoubtedly has the UNRWA bureaucrats drooling, but as with number 1, it's hard to see what's in it for the rest of us. Aren't we handing over enough of our money in welfare payments to our own people? I am starting to think that this might be the best option. House of Representatives, talking to Chris Matthews on Hardball: MATTHEWS: Well, just to repeat, you believe that the Palestinians who are now living on the West Bank should get out of there? When I say "the best option," I don't mean "best for the Palestinians". Being Arabs, they are incapable of constructing a rational polity, so their future is probably hopeless whatever happens. Their options are the ones I listed above: to be ruled by gangsters, or Israelis, or Jordanians, or welfare bureaucrats. Or to go live somewhere else, under the gentle rule of their brother Arabs. I agree with the author, what have the Arabs done lately? Just as the UN has destroyed any Palistinians ambition and make them totally dependent, so to have the democrats and their bureaucratic minions made American blacks totally dependent on the government and without any ambition. If there are problems in Jordan and egypt, they are not making the news. Expel the worthless Palestinians from the land between the River and the Sea. Why should we wish for another gangster-satrapy to be added to the Arab roll of shame, busy manufacturing terrorists to come here and slaughter Americans in their offices? It's the dirty little secret of the entire Israeli-Palestinian mess that no one seems to want to acknowledge. When is the last time a black American blew himself up while murdering a dozen people at a mall and maiming scores of others, eh? I still find it amazing that all of the Arabs countries demand that the US clamp down on Isreal and support the Palesinians but they will not allow the poor Palestinians to settle in any Arab county. Personally I don't really blame them, who would really want people like the Palestinians in their country. To me the Palestinians are the human version of leeches, they have to have someone else support them, feed them, house them. I for one will not be weeping for the Palestinians when Isreal finaly gets tired of them and declares full war and eradicates the pests. The post-colonial history of Africa shows the same, dreadful pattern. There is not a single, well-governed state in subSahara Africa. Best of the lot is South Africa, but recent events suggest it is headed down the same dumper as Zimbabwe. It just started at a higher point, economically, and is taking the slow route, rather than the fast route, to disaster. Looking at the world, the simple truth is that some peoples are culturally incapable of competent government and modern economies, as of now. It is, of course, out of the question for any US President or Secretary of State to say such a thing. It is improper for even a Member of Congress to hint that it might be true. We are supposed to act like we believ... |
| www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/001/161yaihr.asp A little spiffed and a little miffed, and I shouted something and angrily turned off the remote. I don't know exactly how angrily a remote can be turned off, but as angrily as you can push a pfennig-sized piece of round plastic, that's how angrily I did it. Her guests were (INSERT INDISTINGUISHABLE ARAB NAME), from Hamas, and their attorney, Stanley Cohen. I mean, if you tried to make up a better name than that, you couldn't do it. Yes, Stanley Cohen, folks, a hard-left, righteously indignant true-believer, an honors graduate from the William Kunstler School of Just-Not-Getting-It-And-Never-Will, who had flown all the way from New York to sit next to his wonderful client over there in not the land of milk and honey. A man who, if he listened very carefully, would no doubt hear voices in the next room planning to blow the eyes out of more of his nieces and nephews. Stanley Cohen, and even typing that name right now and remembering this horrible man damning his own people again and again and again, I crack a nervous smile, because they're my people, too, and, God help me, if I didn't laugh, I think I might cry. Oddly enough, out of the three of them, the homunculus from Hamas didn't bother me at all. I mean, if you think about it, why should he bother any American? We know exactly who he is and, in a way, we should be grateful for that. Because if we're only willing to absorb their own words--nevermind their demonic deeds--he and his brethren have a perfectly uncomplicated point of view and agenda, and their clarity should give us our own clarity, and wouldn't that be refreshing? And I'll bet their Green Room beats the snot out of Al Jazeera. All they have to do is take a few minutes away from packing rusty nails around the C4, pick one of their guys who looks, relatively, the least like a vicious scumbag, borrow a suit, and send him forth to smile for the cameras. Due to this limitation, you may experience unexpected results within this site. |
| www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/detail/-/books/1566634407/customer- A Practical Manual for Job-Hunters and Career-Changers (2001 Edition) by Richard Nelson Bolles Icon 27 Gnu Emacs Manual by Richard M. Our Customers' Advice See what customers recommend in addition to, or instead of, the product on this page. In a scathing and provocative critique, Pryce-Jones ( Paris in the Third Reich ; Cyril Connolly ) blames these dismal conditions on what he sees as a Muslim reversion to tribal and kinship structures as well as slavish obedience to complex codes of honor and shame that prevent concepts such as open debate, democracy and accountability from taking root. With Islamocentric shortsightedness, Arabs understood Nazism in terms of German revenge for humiliation suffered in World War I. Arab leaders admired both Hitler and Lenin as careerist conspirators who made good. Pryce-Jones sees the same tribal, king-of-the-hill mentality at work today in the Palestine Liberation Organization, a careerist group built around a few audacious personalities who arrogated the right to speak for a whole people. From Library Journal Reporter Pryce-Jones examines shame-honor ranking as a motivational force in Muslim society vying with Western values, while at the same time tracing the negative impact of Europe on Muslim society. The book facilitates an understanding of the Middle East, and the author has provided copious source notes to support his statements. I wouldn't have understood a single day of the Persian Gulf War (II) without David Pryce-Jones' explanation of the Arab mind. When it first came out it was such an anachronism that it was widely ignored, despite the urgency of the issues it addressed. In 1990, arguably the floodstage year of (multi)cultural relativism? Yet world events have hammered home the blunt fact that world cultures are not all alike but for cuisine and headgear, and that some cultures are flatly and demonstratably better than others. He cites many Western scholars, but allows Arab voices plenty of scope to speak, also. Indeed, the book is a good introduction to many interesting Arab writings. It is a demanding subject, even though the book is written for the educated layman, so it is slow going in spots. There is no confident sweep of history as in Bernard Lewis, nor many pungent polemics as in Daniel Pipes. Readers will find themselves skipping to chapters that are of immediate interest, but the entire book is a must-read. Yes No 2 of 2 people found the following review helpful: 5 out of 5 stars A profound analysis, April 6, 2002 Reviewer: 81 neutrinoman (see more about me) from Natick, MA USA Pryce-Jones' book, reissued in 2002, is the best book I've read on the contemporary Middle East, and one of the best books I've ever read, period. What happened on September 11, 2001, and what is happening now in Israel are just the latest examples, albeit with higher stakes. Suicide is a sign of the complete bankruptcy of a society. Self-pitying rage, arising from shame-honor, blocks reason. The wealthy and powerful of the Arab world pour their resources, supported by oil revenue, into such delusions as these. Pryce-Jones wondered, too, for a lifetime, then took three years to produce this "interpretation", which is more comprehensive and lucid than any of the other works I've seen on the subject. His thesis is fairly simple: the Arabs, more than any other society, are bound by a code of shame and honor, which prevents them from advancing in nearly every field of human endeavor. The only dynamism in their sclerotic society is what Pryce-Jones calls "power challenging", the process by which one despot knocks another off his pedestal and assumes it himself, though even this can hardly be called dynamic, since one is just like another. They all operate according to these rules of power challenging, which may more simply be called the law of the jungle. The shame/honor and power challenging theses explain a wide range of phenomena that can be baffling to an outsider. On one of the lowest levels, the village, Pryce-Jones gives the example of a local leader who decides to install an irrigation pump to improve agriculture. When a consultant warns of technical problems, the leader avoids the shame of appearing ignorant by pushing ahead with his plan, heedless of the warning. The pump overirrigates, leading to salinification, which ruins the village agriculture. But instead of being blamed by the village for the ruin, the local leader is honored for getting his way. On a larger scale, why is it that Saudi Arabia, whose total revenues from oil some time ago passed the trillion dollar mark, needs the USA to defend it, needs American and European technicians to operate its oilfields, and needs imported labor from South Asia for any non-technical work? A fighter jet is little more than a trophy to show off to ones friends-and enemies. Even the much-heralded "Man of Peace", Anwar Sadat, began his career as a Nazi sympathizer, writing glowingly of Hitler in 1953 that the German had "become immortal in Germany" and that was "reason enough for pride". Sadat's subsequent protean career as a power holder took him through "pro-Nazi, pro-Soviet, socialist, capitalist, Jew-hater, and peacemaker" phases, the one constant being his always-cunning response to power challengers. After finally being murdered by a determined group of challengers, Sadat was commemorated by a handful of American presidents in his last permutation, that of peacemaker. His power holding legacy is carried on by Mubarak with Sadat's methods of repression and ample amounts of money, gotten not from oil, but from US foreign aid-payoffs for peace. Pryce-Jones' thesis is not that all Arabs are murderous and power hungry. It does seem to be that one can't rise beyond a certain level in Arab society without being so. Anyone who has traveled anywhere in the Middle East or Maghreb has met gentle and hard-working Arabs. Many Arabs would admire a leader such as Martin Luther King. But it would never occur to the leaders of the Arabs to take anything but a venal or violent approach to a problem. It's impossible to conceive, for instance, of Yasser Arafat leading a non-violent protest march through Israeli checkpoints on a day when Gaza was sealed off. Even if he were convinced that such an act would get him what he wanted politically, he would be unable to carry it out because of the enormous shame he would feel at being shown in such an ostensibly powerless position. What is shown in CLOSED CIRCLE is that it is impossible to take power or hold power in Arab society without employing the despotic methods of Gaddhafi or Sadat or Sadam or Faud or Arafat. It's a pity that a book of this stature should be out of print in hardback. Something this vital ought to be available with one of the print-on-demand publishers. Yes No 8 of 9 people found the following review helpful: 4 out of 5 stars The Deepening Tragedy of the Arab World, August 3, 2003 Reviewer: 84 givbatam3 (see more about me) from REHOVOT Israel Although this book came out in 1989, events since then have, unfortunately, only confirmed what is written in it. The thesis of the author is that the Arab world has been unable to break the shackles of its ancient tribal-clan organization of society and build a new civil society found in other parts of the world, particularly in the democratic West. While it is true that in the distant past, all societies were more or less organized on these tribal and clan lines, the more advanced cultures moved onwards and developed societies in which interpersonal and later international relations were based not only on blood kinship but rather on a feeling of mutually-shared responsibility for the world outside their immediate surroundings. Tragically the Arab (and to a large extent, also the Islamic) world has not yet made this shift of mind, whereas others outside Europe and America such as East Asia have succeeded. The author shows that relationships between individual people and countries in the Arab world are made up mostly of suspicion and fear of those outside the "closed circle" of the clan (or country) and this prevents the development of the type of civil society nec... |