My halo just slipped. This blog now has a Tip Jar.
Sunday, March 28, 2004
Imshin's Story
The Israeli blogger Imshin is one of my favorites because she is able to blend the personal and the political so well, giving us an excellent perspective on what it's like to be on the front lines in the terror war (or whatever you want to call it)--a kind of supermarket's eye view of horror. Recently, she has been rather calm, reminding us that so far the targeted killing of Sheik Yassin has not resulted in the calamities predicted. Even the Islamic world has been surprisingly quiet:
So you see, I have no particular fear as a result of the Yassin killing. I know my army, my security services and my government, are doing their utmost to protect me. They were before and they are now. I didn't change anything in my way of life as a result. I went to the mall, I went running with Bish in the park a few times, Eldest went out twice collecting donations door-to-door for some charity or other, I got the number five bus to work every morning, I walked home every afternoon (thankfully, not getting run over by a motorbike when crossing the road). And I must say, I didn"t notice any less people in the shops, in the cafes or in the streets. On the contrary, it's two weeks before Pesach (Passover). The shops are packed; the atmosphere in the supermarket is one of frantic activity. It's all hogwash, silly Left Wing scaredy-pants propaganda, the Media inventing news. It hasn't happened.
Further down she dares to say:
Maybe a lot of Palestinians are secretly relieved to see him go. Maybe they’re fed up and want it to finish already. Maybe they have long ago stopped believing the promises of people like Yassin that Israel is close to breaking point.
Let's hope. We live in times when our opinions swing by the day, sometimes by the hour. I know I'm that way. Reading reports of the Clarke testimony in the blogosphere, I think to myself, well, they've nailed that sleazy hypocrite. Then, a few minutes later, I'm watching the same events on CNN, listening to the talking heads on Larry King, and I'm sure the "terror expert" is going to take down the president for no reason. So reading someone like Imshin, who has to face the reality of these events on the front lines on a daily basis, staying calm and cool, is reassuring.
But speaking of Richard Clarke, I had a small epiphany about him last night. Probably many have thought the same thing but I will offer it anyway because it explains the book and his often contradictory testimony. Clarke is a man who spent his life trying to get terrorists and just when it started to get really interesting, when, mostly because of 9/11, a President finally was ready to get serious about the problem, he (Clarke) was already out of a job (or nearly). The natural "little boy" response is "Hey, what about me!" The rest you are watching on television.
Meanwhile, I will continue to read Imshin who is telling me more about terrorism than anybody at the hearings.
AND MORE MEANWHILE... Apparently new Hamas chief/pediatrician Abdel Aziz (not your father's Dr. Spock) Rantisi stated Sunday that "US President George W. Bush is the enemy of God and Islam. He also declared that God's war against the United States and Israel was ongoing." Sorry, Dr. Rantisi. Sheryl and I just changed physicians for Madeleine and we're happy with our new one. But we'll keep you in mind.
PS: The "good doctor" goes on to make Imshin's point for her. According to this same AP report: Rantisi also suggested the Arab world is letting down the Palestinians. "I want to tell the Arab leaders, you will be asked by God ... about the blood of Sheik Ahmed Yassin," he said.
More Oil-for-Food, Palaces, Dictatorships (you name it)
Several people have alerted me to this article by Roger Franklin, which appeared today (or is it tomorrow?) in the Australian and New Zealandan press. Nothing particularly new here, but it is reassuring to see the word being passed Down Under (though I am sure Tim Blair has already had much to say) about this scandal, which reveals so much about the real reasons for the resistance to the overthrow of Saddam. It is amusing, however, to see Mr. Franklin begin by connecting to an earlier, smaller scale UN scandal I blogged about some time ago:
Almost a year ago, when kitchen workers at the United Nations' headquarters walked off the job in a dispute over holiday pay, the cream of the world's diplomats thronged to the five unattended restaurants there and stole everything that wasn't nailed down.
As one witness marvelled after seeing an envoy make off with a baked turkey under one arm and a framed picture under the other: "They were locusts!"
The next day, however, the incident had not happened - not officially, anyway.
A UN spokesman swore blind that a senior official, concerned that his colleagues might go hungry, had granted permission for staff to help themselves. In other words: no mass theft. As excuses go, it was not bad.
If all pillage was as easy to explain, the UN might not today be facing what is shaping up as the biggest scandal in its history. This time it's not about cutlery and baked hams, but at least $11 billion, depending on who is doing the counting - or rather, the guessing, since the UN has been disinclined to investigate.
As I reported before, I ate in the delegate's dining room at the UN not long ago. It's open to the public with a reservation and quite a good deal (excellent view of the East River too). Go if you get a chance. At least it's a way to get a few of your tax dollars back.
As I have previously stated, I think the present 9/11 hearings are sound and fury signifying nothing ("Garbage Time" in basketball parlance). Neither Bush nor Clinton did enough to stop terrorism before 9/11. Nobody did really. That's evident. Terrorism occurred on both of their watches. Did we need a hearing to tell us that? And any details of significance are intelligence matters that can't be discussed publicly. So this whole event is political gamesmanship at its most obvious and tedious. But as we all know, most of the jockeying has coalesced around the testimony of Richard Clarke who has contradicted himself so many times he should run for office. [Maybe that's his plan.--ed.]
Now we learn via a "blistering" speech from Senate Majory Leader Frist that some of Clarke's former sworn testimony will be made public. Republicans say he has perjured himself; Democrats say he hasn't. (Big surprise!) But a careful reading of this morning's WaPo GOP Leaders Seek Release of Clarke's 2002 Testimony leads me to believe Clarke may be on shaky ground. This quote is revealing:
Some Democratic lawmakers who heard Clarke's testimony in both settings said they found no inconsistencies. Sen. Bob Graham (news, bio, voting record) (D-Fla.), who was co-chairman of the joint intelligence inquiry, said in a statement, "To the best of my recollection, there is nothing inconsistent or contradictory in that testimony [from 2002] and what Mr. Clarke has said this week."
To the best of my recollection? Hmm... The article says further down: Clarke did not respond to e-mails and phone calls seeking comment yesterday.
Well, what goes around comes around, as they say. Just remember this: it's our money that's being spent on this partisan nonsense. When it's a dull game, I don't usually sit through "Garbage Time."
Well not really jealous, because I admire him and his work tremendously and that trumps jealousy for me anytime (Thank the Goddess!). But I felt I had to say that before I wrote these comments on his new film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind because, as one who has been reviewed many times (and also reviewed others), I know that reviews are so often corrupted by the feelings of the reviewer about the artist or by the reviewer's desire to show how smart he is (sell his own book or movie). That’s the not-so-hidden secret about reviewing.
Still, as a screenwriter, I was blown away by Kaufman’s work on this film, blown away by his skill, but even more by his courage. Writing scripts in Hollywood, the world knows, is a game of compromise ending with the negation of one’s art. Not only are writers beaten down by the commerciality of the system, they are also overwhelmed by the mythos that only directors create films. Of course the latter is ridiculous. The great directors are almost always the ones who preserve great scripts (frequently their own writing). Kaufman, however, has managed to dismiss all that and, as a writer, addresses the film medium the way a novelist addresses the empty page (or monitor these days). He uses the medium as he wants, tossing aside the received “wisdom” and, in the case of Adaptation, making fun of it at the same time.
In Eternal Sunshine he is deconstructing the traditional romantic comedy form and ultimately taking romance itself more seriously by doing that. He gives us a real world vision of acceptance that you don’t get from Tracy and Hepburn films, not that I don’t love their movies; in fact they are great in an historic sense that Kaufman’s may never achieve. But that kind of filmmaking doesn’t work anymore really. Cukor’s world is gone. As if to demonstrate that, the preview for Laws of Attraction—a Julianne Moore/Pierce Brosnan knock off of Adam’s Rib, two lawyer/lovers jousting—appeared before Eternal Sunshine. It looked dismal and forced, predictable in the way a film is that you’ve already seen on the late show years ago and start to remember all too easily; only you’ve never seen this new one before, so it’s worse.
Kaufman’s movie is the opposite of that. It is always surprising you, ordering and reordering time and the truth. It seems as if it were written in opposition to all the rules of screenwriting preached at those dimwitted courses given in airport hotels, without an outline, made up as it went along so it would astonish its author along with its reader. Etonnez-moi, Diaghlev wrote as his prescription for art. Charlie Kaufman does that. The film only has one problem—its leading man, Jim Carrey. Unfortunately, an excellent farceur but not a true actor, he’s not quite up to the task. Kate Winslet, however, is great. She’s just as good in her modern way as that other Kate (Hepburn). The director's work is also competent, but in this case at least, beside the point.
Ron Rosenbaum says "sayonara" to the Left in this brilliant essay. Don't miss it! [I thought he already said that.--ed. And doesn't "sayonara" imply coming back later? Yeah, but I think he's burning his bridges this time. Maybe you did too. Could be.]
One mordantly amusing graph:
Goodbye to the deluded and pathetic sophistry of postmodernists of the Left, who believe their unreadable, jargon-clotted theory-sophistry somehow helps liberate the wretched of the earth. If they really believe in serving the cause of liberation, why don't they quit their evil-capitalist-subsidized jobs and go teach literacy in a Third World starved for the insights of Foucault?
I guess you could call them "chickenintellectuals."
(NOTE: This column, posted on the New York Observer website today, first appeared in the print edition of the same paper on 10/14/2002.)
Way back when I first read the Byron York article, reporting that a large number of important Saudis, friends and relatives of the royal family and Bin Laden (same thing), had been allowed to leave the US without investigation immediately following 9/11, I thought--Wow, there's the MacGuffin for my next mystery! I scribbled down a rough outline and sent it to my agent in New York who was notably unimpressed. Thank God, because lo-and-behold, the true Mr. Big behind this has already been revealed (long before any novel would have been published) as none other than... Richard Clarke! (via JustOneMinute) I could never have come up with anything better than that.
But all is not lost... This morning Debkafile--the thriller writer's best friend--is reporting a veritable cesspool of evil double-dealing retrieved by American forces during those document searches in Baghdad. Apparently, a huge percentage of the Egyptian government, military and media had been bribed (with UN Oil-for-Food money, of course, in any good novel!) by Iraqi intelligence and were essentially working for Iraq. This was so pervasive that plans for joint Egyptian-American war games were download to Iraqi computers. Virtually the entire Arab League seems to have been under contract to Saddam, with Russian and Czech diplomats thrown into the bargain. There's even a Mata Hari in the story, the wife of an important Egyptian diplomat. Don't know how good-looking she is, but I can promise in my version she'd be sensational (Selma Hayek?--ed. She's Latina. Never mind.).
Naturally, Mubarek--whose biggest concern is his son's acceding to his throne--is mightily disturbed. Cairo prisons are filling up (good scenes there!). In all, not a bad book, and now that Edward Said has passed on, I wouldn't be so easily accused of "Orientalism."
But wait, there's more. We all recall the theory that the missing WMDs are in Syria. I blogged in January about a Syrian dissident named Nayouf living in Paris who had many interesting things to say about this, including detailed maps, bank accounts, etc. Well, Mr. Nayouf has been robbed and his CD ROMS (with all those details) stolen. By whom? According to this article, (hat tip: Franco Aleman) the DST (French intelligence). Not surprisingly, they deny it, while at the same time calling Nayouf into their office and asking for his computer password. (Not very good writing, fellas. Too dumb. The readers would dismiss it.) Furthermore, Nayouf faces possible extradition back to his homeland where, as we again all know, dissidents are not exactly welcome. He might as well go straight to one of those Cairo prisons. And again not surprisingly, some of the information on the missing CD ROMS concerned a fund traceable to Iraq being set up for the reelection of a certain fellow named Jacques. A perfect plot, no? But alas too obvious. What can I say? I'll have to keep looking.
I'd just like to call attention to the new ad for my pal Marc Cooper's (fine) new book on this site. Some of you may know Marc's excellent work from the LA Weekly and The Nation, among other publications. I am particularly delighted to have this ad because it is a pleasure to me, as an author, to help promote the work of writers I like. More, please.
Punished for Democracy-- more on Oil-for-Food (okay, Palaces) (updated)
As we all know, the Iraqi Kurds have been in the forefront of instituting democracy, rights for women, etc., in that part of the world. Of course, the United Nations, from its track record, hasn't seem too concerned with those kinds of things. And now we have this from the New York Post , which is stepping to the front of the line on this important issue.
The United Nations allowed Saddam Hussein to shortchange Iraqi Kurds out of billions of dollars from the scandal-plagued oil-for-food program, and funds for the oppressed population mysteriously vanished after the war, The Post has learned.
I hope the forthcoming Congressional Hearings on the subject delve into this allegation from Howard Ziad, the Kurdish liaison to the United Nations:
U.N. Security Council resolutions mandated that 13 percent of the money generated by the oil-for-food program be earmarked to the Kurdish region.
But Ziad charged that the United Nations gave Saddam "too much control" over the allocation of the humanitarian aid when the program was launched in 1997.
As a result, vital projects, such as building hospitals and schools, providing water and electricity, and removing land mines in the Kurdish region languished, Ziad said.
At the same time, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan personally approved oil-for-food money for many of Saddam's pet projects, including a $20 million "Olympic Sport City" for Uday Hussein, Saddam's son, and $50 million for TV and radio equipment for Iraq's propaganda machine, according to the United Nations' own records.
To quote Michael Ledeen, "Faster, please." (hat tip: HH)
UPDATE: More "mainstream" traction in the WaPo. (hat tip: Ray Eckhardt)
...and the superb video by Evan Coyne Maloney linked on Instapundit today has a clear one to me--why the present Congressional Hearings are nonsense! See it and laugh.
Remember that ugly word that came up so often only a few years ago? Bill Clinton, under assault for just about any crime under the sun, was able to soldier on in his job. George Bush seems able to do the same thing, even capable of cracking a couple of halfway decent witticisms along the way. Howard Dean, as we recall, was not. John Kerry seems sketchy at best.
Is this a necessary skill for the modern presidency in this insane media era? If so, maybe we should elect this man who is able to out-compartmentalize (now there's a hideous word) anyone. Yesterday he got up at four AM, flew from LA to somewhere near Vail, Colorado, sat through a hearing on a trial that could put him in jail for life (and he's still 25) and then returned to LA to arrive at the Staples Center 45 minutes before game time and pour down 36 points in destroying the Sacramento Kings, thought to be the greatest team in basketball. Now that's compartmentalization!
The contents of this page--properly done--could gross a couple of hundred million at least. [So why aren't you writing it?--ed. Too lazy, er, too busy.] (shaken, not stirred, by Vodkapundit)
What do you say when an entire society goes psychotic? What do you do about it? You can't put everyone in a hospital. Yet when I read a few minutes ago that another Palestinian child ... okay, he's 16, but in the photo he looks about 12... has tried to kill himself for the greater glory of God or whatever, I couldn't help but be flummoxed. According to the AP:
A Palestinian teenager approached a crowded West Bank checkpoint wearing a suicide bomb vest Wednesday in what Israel said was a failed attempt to kill soldiers there.
In a tense scene captured in exclusive Associated Press Television News footage, soldiers jumped behind concrete barricades and sent a yellow robot to hand scissors to the 16-year-old boy so he could cut off the vest. They then ordered him to strip to his underwear.
Experts later detonated the bomb, and there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the incident.
The teenager's family in Nablus identified him as Hussam Abdo, and his brother, Hosni, said "he has the intelligence of a 12-year-old."
Thank God (or human science) for robots. The end of the article reminds us: Last month, Israeli police arrested three boys, aged 12, 13 and 15, who said they were on their way to carry out a shooting attack in the Israeli city of Afula.
It's been a while (early nineties) since I've been to Israel. I also visited the West Bank at the time. (Ramallah, Nablus and even Jenin). Even then photographs of such "martyrs" were plastered everywhere. If, as the shrinks tell us, child abuse is a cycle (and they have a lot of proof on this one), we are in for a grim future. (NOTE: The accompanying AP video--same link--is worth watching).
Meanwhile, in our nation's capital, the 9/11 hearing continues, throwing out even more heat and less light than the day before. Contradiction follows contradiction. No one is honest, everyone tendentious, particularly the star witness who is busily flogging his own book which promulgates opinions, even if only a few of his own previous quotations are accurate, he either never held until recently or lied about in the past. I could provide links, but there are so many it's pointless. Here are justafew. Do Congressional Hearings actually have a point anymore? I wonder. Sly Stone used to sing "Ev'ry Body is a Star!" Now "Ev'rybody is a Spin Doctor."
UPDATE: Seems like somebody "got to" Bob Kerrey last night. After (uniquely) receiving so much praise for his even-handedness at yesterday's hearings, today the former senator blasted Fox News for publishing a "background briefing" given in '02 by Dick Clarke (not the bandstander, the grandstander) to a "handful" of reporters. In that briefing, Clarke completely contradicts what he later said in his book, proving, one assumes, that he had to be lying once. Or do we have another flip-flopper on our hands?
AND GET THIS: While the moribund self-styled "left" is carping at Bush in some dimwitted Hearing, even Ghaddafi's son is backing the President's push for democracy in the Middle East (and praising Israel into the bargain!). Read it! (via LGF)
I seem to be saddled with a small responsibility to keep people informed (and the pressure on) on the ongoing UN Oil-for-Food Scandal. The New York Post is reporting this morning:
"U.N. bureaucrats are stonewalling requests from Iraq's new government for records from the scandal-plagued oil-for-food account set up in Saddam Hussein's handpicked French bank, officials said yesterday.
The mysterious activities over the handling of the U.N. account at the French banking giant BNP Paribas, where $100 billion worth of oil-for-food transactions flowed until the war, has emerged as a central focus of several investigations in the wake of the massive bribery-kickback scandal that has rocked the world body at its highest levels."
Further on the Post notes:
A spokesman for the United Nations said records had been turned over the coalition authority, although he was not sure whether the bank statements were included.
"Not sure," huh? Maybe they should contact Rosemary Woods. Meanwhile...
A spokesman for BNP Paribas could not be reached for comment, but the company said in a previous statement: "We believe we were appointed by the United Nations for this contract, because they were looking for a large European institution, and we are the largest bank in Continental Europe."
From my own (miniscule) experience of this bank, I have a small suggestion. Several years ago, while putting together the financing of an independent film, I found BNP Paribas was one of the major loan sources for such productions. Perhaps the Oil-for-Food money got Lost in Translation.
UPDATE: Instapundit is calling for a Congressional investigation of this scandal. I couldn't agree more. So does, evidently, Henry Hyde who has scheduled one for next month (scroll down).
Before I married Sheryl I wasn't a dog lover. It wasn't that I was anti-dog or anything, I just never had one. But since we've been together (almost ten years), I've become one of those boring people who say, "Oh, my God, you have a French bulldog too!... etc." (Actually we have had two greyhounds, one of which is the subject of a forthcoming book by Sheryl, being published next year.) Also, now that pipes have gone more than slightly out of fashion (thirty or forty years), dogs remain the "writer's boon companion" and Zane Greyhound is slumped on his dog bed next to me as I type this. He's been frequent consolation while I talk on the phone with editors and producers anxious to "help me improve my work."
So it was with great interest I read the following buried in Cindy Adams' column in the NY Post this morning:
ISRAELI terror experts label dogs the new weapon in their war. They claim Islamic radicals believe dogs are dirty and if Fido's blood mixes with that of a "martyr," the martyr won't ascend to paradise. These experts want dogs placed at sites most threatened by suicide bombers.
Although this seems like a good idea (similar to the Russians wrapping shahids in pigskin), my feelings were somewhat mixed (Not Zane, I hope!). But it also made me wonder about theological evolution in the Middle East. What brought Islam to think dogs were unclean and, especially, continue to think so, when they were so obviously bred to be the companion of humans? Way back when, before there was Islam, as we all know, people in the region worshipped Anubis who had the head of either a dog or a jackal. In any case, if this primitive supersition about a friendly animal can save human lives, I'm for it.
(BTW, as I recall, Musharaff got into trouble with Islamic fundamentalists for having a dog. Given recent events, perhaps he was just trying to protect himself.)
Haaretz is reporting on Bush's first public statement on the Yassin assassination:
"Israel has the right to defend herself from terror, and, as she does so, I hope she keeps consequences in mind," Bush said.
This is quite elegantly put. (The myth of Bush's stupidity is beyond laughable.) Haaretz, being published originally in Hebrew, can be excused for slightly confusing the meaning. Their lede reads: U.S. President George W. Bush said on Tuesday Israel had the right to defend itself against Hamas but urged the Israeli government to keep "the consequences in mind." The difference between "but" and "and" in this instance is clearly important. Bush seems to have been signaling more acceptance than Haaretz realizes (or wishes--who knows?).
Sheikh Said Siam, another senior functionary of Hamas, earlier gave Maariv Online the first official confirmation for reports that appeared recently in the Arab press that the United States offered the organization's leader Sheikh Ahmad Yasin immunity from attempts on his life in return for a stop to terrorist attacks.
This immunity, according to Sheikh Siam, would have applied only to the political wing of Hamas and not to its armed wing, the Iz a-Din el-Kassam Brigades. The offer was relayed to Yasin by intermediaries, but he rejected it saying "the blood of Hamas leaders is no dearer than that of a Palestinian child."
If this is so, it indicates the Unites States was in some form of (constant?) communication with the Israelis on their actions. In other words, no wonder Bush is not condemning the assassination of Yassin.
... if you can still call it that... is encapsulated in a post on Instapundit this morning. Commenting on email he received which describes an American editor looking "crestfallen" at the report of the possible capture of Ayman Al-Zawahiri, Reynolds writes: "I don't think that editor is alone, though I doubt an actual majority of his colleagues feel that way. But some clearly do, letting their Bush-hatred trump their patriotism."
Indeed, as the man himself would say. But I might replace the word "patriotism" with even stronger ones, "basic human morality," because we are talking about an international mass murderer here who is quite capable of planting weapons of mass destruction anywhere. So that is the pass we have come to in partisan politics in our society, an ordinary member of our media willing to sacrifice those core values to defeat Bush. Quite spooky when you think about it. The incessant Republican attacks on Clinton for lying about his private life and other supposed (often non-existent) activities were bad enough, but this is something outrageous and, frankly, on the edge of sociopathy.
These forms of political jihad are not entirely unrelated to what is going on in Washington right now--a seeming investigation into the causes of 9/11 which has been transmogrified into nothing more than a glorified "gotcha game" on both sides. Nothing (NOTHING!) could be more obvious than neither the Republicans nor the Democrats paid sufficient attention to Al Qaeda before 9/11. But is anyone (ANYONE?) admitting this simple and ridiculously evident fact. Not that I can see on either side. And who suffers? The American people, of course, because all we get is heat and no light at the very moment that civilization hangs in the balance. Shame!
UPDATE: For more sophisticated (and ultimately more reassuring) observations on the state of things than you are likely to find in Washington go here.
For those of you of a certain age (who me?) and suddenly becoming increasingly interested in the subject of life extension, the evidence that caloric restriction is the secret to longevity is continuing to grow. The latest report is from a research team at UC Riverside, led by Stephen R. Spindler, who have been working on mice. Said Spindler, if such findings translate to humans... "this could mean a lot more years and a lot of good years. The mice on caloric restriction lived longer and they are healthier." According to their research, this life extension even applies to those who reduce their intake at age 60 (human years obviously), although those who start out on restricted diets could possibly double their years (if they are mice).
Okay, let's assume this translates to humans (and I'm betting it does to some extent), how many of us can do it? I tried a couple of years ago and lasted about three months. I dropped about thirty pounds and felt terrific. Everyone said I looked great, except my mother who thought I looked malnourished (there's a message in that!). But then, of course, I fell off the wagon and regained seventy-five percent of what I had lost.
Now I am thinking of trying again to go "underweight." I have a five-year old daughter and would like to live to know her as an adult. This should be an incentive, but will it be as great an incentive as a slice of camembert and a baguette? We shall see.
The pseudonymous "Gabriel Gonzalez," an American living and working in Paris for many years who frequently writes comments on this blog, has a long and knowledgeable overview of the situation in France posted on Winds of Change. It is too good to excerpt. Go read it.
UPDATE: Gabriel Gonzalez had added his own comments below with a link to this article by Walid Phares, which I have just read. It is a amplification of Nelson Ascher's ideas discussed below, but with a twist at the end even LeCarré would not have not have thought of. Boy, do I hope Phares is wrong, but I fear he is not.
Meanwhile, putting it all together, read this. Now try to sleep tonight. (hat tip: Catherine Johnson)
They say authors are like hookers and will go anywhere and do anything to sell their books. (Who me? Look right!) The latest to shake his booty is Richard Clarke, the "terrorism expert" [What does that mean?--ed. He reads more than one newspaper a day.] who is flogging his new tome called Against All Enemies. Now as any fool who knows the Coulter/Moore Theorem of Basic Book Promotion understands, don't be reasonable, always be as extreme as possible, so Clarke says:
"FRANKLY, I FIND IT OUTRAGEOUS that the president is running for re-election on the grounds that he's done such great things about terrorism. He ignored it. He ignored terrorism for months, when maybe we could have done something to stop 9/11. Maybe. We'll never know."
Now as Stephen Hayes correctly points out the exact same thing could be said of Clinton, for whom Clarke was an advisor. (Obviously, Stephen hasn't been trying to sell any books lately. It's a tough market.)
But since I'm not selling a book on terrorism at this precise second, I will try to be honest: I don't blame Bush or Clinton. Very few human beings would have moved with the necessary alacrity against terrorism before 9/11. We're just not built that way. Also, it would have been nigh onto impossible to mobilize the American public sufficiently. So what I'm saying is what Clarke is selling is a bunch of BS and I'm not buying. [But if you must, please use the Amazon link to the right.--ed.]
UPDATE: The New York Times is now weighing in on this brouhaha near the top of its website (and I presume on its front page) with a Todd Purdum article categorized as "News Analysis." Needless to say it doesn't deal with the fact that Clinton's and Bush's policies toward Al Qaeda were nearly the same until 9/11. I guess that doesn't fit with their "analysis."
The assassination of Sheik Ahmed Yassin made me reflect on my position on capital punishment, although only briefly because this is an area (there's one at least!) I haven't wavered on much for many years. I oppose capital punishment in general with one important exception, politically motivated serial killers like Sheik Yassin. These people even when imprisoned for life are a serious threat to murder again. They have too many adherents all too willing to break them out of jail. (Yassin himself was essentially coerced out of prison in a controversial prisoner swap only to return to Gaza and instigate a wave of suicide bombings.)
Also, the assassination of such people is wholly justifiable. They are your adversaries in a declared/undeclared war. In Yassin's case, of course, it was totally declared. He spoke openly of the destruction of Israel on a daily basis and acted upon it. The characterization of Yassin as an impotent old man by such venues as the BBC and the Evening Standard is hypocritical nonsense (actually worse than that, but I don't feel like getting into it now). If a leader of such a nature had been sitting in another country sending waves of bombers into England blowing up buses, the Brits would have killed him in a heartbeat were they able. So I notice with grim amusement that British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw too is calling the assassination "unacceptable, unjust." I wonder what he would have called Clinton's attempt to assassinate Bin Laden with those cruise missiles. I call it "bad marksmanship."
UPDATE: In email, Honest Reporting notes AFP and CNN are calling Sheik Yassin a "spiritual leader".... sort of like Charlie Manson, I guess.
ADD: Of course, the assassination of Yassin cannot be separated from the planned Israeli pullback from Gaza, which Hamas was trumpeting as their victory. This was a prescription for longterm disaster and had to be countered. And according to this report, the Americans were at least generally aware of the strategy.
UPDATE: Belmont Club brilliantly places this assassination in a larger context.
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-- Tom Robbins
"Mordantly funny... Simon's satiric humor thrives on absurdity; and once Moses is
in the director's chair, trying to salvage a project that will eventually (by hook and by crook) make it to Sundance,
this sendup of Hollywood greed and bad taste wins the jury prize."
-- Marilyn Stasio, NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
"…realistic and amusing. I read the whole thing in two sittings and enjoyed it very much. He
offers insight into the world of filmmaking that readers will find hilarious."
-- Glenn Reynolds, MSNBC.com
"The initial boos from the left—for whom Wine has been a hero since his first appearance
as the one radical detective in the 1973 The Big Fix—and tentative cheers from the right will have faded by the end of the
book, when both are laughing too hard to care. Moses hasn't changed his political stripes all that much, and the main target
of his creator's satire is one everybody enjoys ridiculing: the motion picture industry."
-- Jon L. Breen, THE WEEKLY STANDARD
"On his first day as head of security for a movie being shot in Prague, Moses
Wine (making believe he's a Variety reporter for reasons too complicated to summarize here) meets the city's Grand Rabbi, who
asks him, 'Perhaps you would like an exclusive interview with the only screenwriter in Eastern Europe who gives kabala
classes to foreigners on a riverboat cruise ship with catered kosher dinners in the style of the Vilna ghetto?' That lovely
snatch of tossed cultural salad sums up the wacky pleasures of Roger L. Simon's eighth book about Wine -- the Berkeley
radical who literally changed the face of mystery fiction in 1978's 'The Big Fix.'"
--Dick Adler, CHICAGO TRIBUNE
"'Director's Cut,' with its footloose plot and its wisecracking lead, is about
as serious as a Marx Brothers movie--which means that Moses Wine gets to do his patriotic bit after all. In the darkest
days, they also serve who make us laugh."
-- Tom Nolan, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
"A particularly relevant plot, then, filled with action and suspense and
set against arresting Czech backgrounds. Recommended."
-- Library Journal
"Simon's savvy Hollywood satire raises troubling questions about our B-grade
domestic preparedness efforts."
-- Booklist
"Director's Cut is a timely thriller, loaded with absorbing insider snippets about
the film industry, humorous jabs at governmental bureaucracy and a general disregard for icons of any sort."
-- Bruce Tierney, BookPage
"Roger L. Simon is a talented writer who can always be counted on to deliver
a chilling thriller."
-- Harriet Klausner, Allreaders.com
"Like a fine wine, Moses just keeps getting better and better. It's one heck of a surreal roller coaster
ride full of the sophisticated satire and wry wit Roger L. Simon is famous for."
-- Anne Barringer, Old Book Barn Gazette
"A quarter of a century after he first appeared in the
now-classic The Big Fix, Moses Wine remains a private investigator par excellence."
-- In Other Words, Mystery
Sunday, March 28, 2004
