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TALLRITE BLOG 
ARCHIVE
This archive, organized into months, contains all issues prior to the current week and the three preceding weeks, which are published in 
the main Tallrite Blog (www.tallrite.com/blog.htm).  
The first issue appeared on Sunday 14th July 2002

ISSUE #68 - 22nd February 2004[150+153]

Palestinians Condemned to Unthinking Leadership

Raymond Dean is one of Ireland’s leading contemporary composers.  With over 80 compositions and operas to his name, he is an accomplished musician with a well-deserved reputation. 

However, that’s just his day job.  For he is also Chairman of the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, and I recently attended one of his talks about the Palestine question. 

He gave an excellent review of the history of modern Palestine and the creation of Israel, starting with the arrival in 1882 of the first Jews fleeing pogroms in Eastern Europe, which I have summarised and fleshed out below.

Early Zionism

Where

Then came the newly founded UN’s (non-binding) Resolution 181 in 1947, which established the State of Israel in 55% of the Palestinian lands and handed the West Bank to Jordan.  It was swiftly followed by further post-Holocaust Jewish immigration and the build-up of a well armed Israeli Military.  

The UN resolution was however rejected by most Arabs, understandably.  But their rejection also means that the areas occupied by the Palestinians do not form a State and are thus, in effect, unallocated land.  (This is important, because it means the so-called “occupied territories” where Israel has built settlements are in fact “disputed territories”.)  

Wars

In 1948 the first Arab/Israeli war broke out, which resulted in defeat for the Arabs.  Israel took the opportunity to ethnically cleanse some 750,000 Palestinians, who became refugees and whose numbers have today swollen to nearly four million. 

Some years later, Gamel Abdel Nasser, the strongman president of Egypt, began to flex his muscles, culminating in the nationalisation of the Suez canal in 1956 (to finance building the Aswan Dam).  Outraged, the Israelis, British and French invaded Egypt to reclaim it, only to have to retreat humiliatingly under disapproving US financial pressure.  This was the Arabs’ first and sole victory over Israel, albeit only because of the Americans. 

Following the Suez crisis of 1956, the PLO was formed and Yasser Arafat emerged to found Fatah, both bent on armed guerilla resistance to the Jewish presence in Israel/Palestine.  

Meanwhile, Nasser, spurred on by victory and thus now a hero, talked of uniting the Arab nation and “driving the Jews into the sea”.  He found a ready audience among not just Palestinians but all Arab countries, who spent fortunes on armaments.  In alarm, Israel prepared for war, simultaneously provoking Nasser by encroaching on demilitarised zones between Israel and its neighbours. 

In June 1967, Israel pre-emptively attacked all its neighbours at once. In just six stunning days, it 

Shortly afterwards, the UN passed (non-binding) Resolution 242 which essentially calls for three things :

1. Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the conflict (“territories”, not “the territories”);
2. The need to achieve a just settlement of the refugee problem;
3. Acknowledgment of the right of every States in the area to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force.

From then to now, the Arab/Palestinian side and its advocates continually stress the first two items but remain silent on the third.  

But so long as the Arabs ignore #3, they provide a cast-iron excuse for the Israelis to ignore #1 and #2. 

The weary story goes on.  

Peace Beckons

Finally, 1993 brought something positive : the Oslo accords between the PLO and Israel, the first real peace process.  It earned the Nobel Peace Prize for Mr Arafat and Israeli ministers Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin (and Rabin his assassination).  

Mr Arafat returned home to chair the new Palestinian Authority after a pseudo-election, and aid money poured in.  The process sputtered on, with acts of bad faith on both sides, throughout Bill Clinton's presidency until, just before it ended, he eventually managed to corral the two antagonists in Camp David in a final thrust for peace.  

Yet as we know, the Camp David talks between Chairman Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak in 2000 failed, and the current deadly intifada broke out, with no end now in sight.  Several first-hand recollections have been published of what went on and why the talks collapsed, but they are biased towards one side or the other and frequently conflicting.  You therefore have to read an array of different accounts to get some sense of what actually happened.  The New York Review of Books has published a good series of such articles featuring the memories Robert Malley (pro-Palestinians), Dennis Ross (pro-Israelis) and Mr Barak.  

From these and the pro-Palestinian views of Mr Dean, this is my best understanding of what happened and why.  

The basis of the 1993 Oslo accords was that a series of relatively easy steps would be taken by each side over time.  This would build the confidence to negotiate the most contentious issues (Jerusalem, settlements, refugees) at some later undefined date.  The easy concessions were always easy; but they did not make the hard concessions any easier, so the tough items were never tackled at all.  The process was eventually going nowhere. 

Mr Barak's big idea at Camp David in 2000 was therefore to tie everything, big and small, into one great all-or-nothing deal, and “nothing” would mean no Oslo either.  High risk, high reward.  But he was afraid to put his proposals all on the table at once, or in writing, for fear Mr Arafat would grab the concessions and run.  Therefore they were communicated personally and verbally by Mr Clinton as a series of “what-ifs”.  

For his part, Mr Arafat apparently never wanted to attend in the first place - so I wonder why he did.  Nevertheless, once  there he was so acutely suspicious of a trap, that he gave no serious consideration to any of the proposals and just said no to everything for two solid weeks, to the exasperation of Mr Clinton.  

Other than vague threats of a unilateral declaration of independence, he made no proposals of his own whatsoever and eventually just walked out and launched the present violent intifada.  He was not helped by the internal wrangling and indiscipline of his own team. 

Mr Barak's offer for peace was so extraordinarily broad it might never have been sold to the Israeli population.  It is quite incredible that Mr Arafat turned it down, letting Mr Barak off the hook :  

There can be only one conclusion from Camp David.  

That Mr Arafat was simply incapable - or (more likely) selfishly unwilling - to make peace.  He knows only war and sees no function for himself in a peaceful landscape.  

The Palestinians' Curse

This encapsulates the curse of ordinary well-meaning Palestinians, and indeed citizens in nearly all Muslim countries.  Most are led by corrupt, illegitimate, selfish thugs such as Mr Arafat, and no analysis or thought goes into their wild actions.  

This was the very lament of Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammed in his (in)famous valedictory speech to last October's Islamic Summit Conference in Kuala Lumpur, remembered for the line “The Jews Rule the World by Proxy”.  But his true message was that fourteen centuries of Muslim failure are because Muslims, unlike Jews, lash out blindly at their enemies, instead of thinking first.  In fact, as Muslim pundit Irshad Manji says in her new book “The Trouble with Islam”, their clergy actively prevent free thought and this has led directly to failure.  

Until Mr Arafat goes, to be replaced by a thinker with 

the Palestinians have absolutely no hope for peace or victory, regardless of how many suicide-bombers their cowardly leaders dispatch.  Their outlook is truly bleak.  

The Israelis, surrounded by large enemies who openly want to drive them into the sea, are thoughtful, determined, strong, armed with nuclear weapons, democratic and have nowhere to go.  They will never give up or be defeated.  Those Holocaustan words “never again” ring in their ears.  

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Making Light of Slaughter

A curious little kabuki of words was played out last week in the columns of the (subscription-only) Irish Times and on RTÉ's Liveline radio programme.  

It began innocuously when Arthur Morgan, a Sinn Féin TD (member of the Irish Parliament) complained on 12 February that the Minister of the Environment sometimes poses for the cameras surrounded by comely models.  The Minister, he said, is treating women “wearing brightly coloured and unusual attire ... as ornaments in campaigns ... to enhance a photo and get him publicity ... He should remember he's a Government Minister, not Michael Schumacher, and instead be encouraging the participation of women in politics and decision-making”.  How very worthy.  

Sean Ward then wrote in to ask whether Mr Morgan also had  a problem with four Sinn Féin TDs (including Mr Morgan) being photographed, smiling proudly, beside the killers of Detective Jerry McCabe in Castlerea Prison last year ?  

Garda McCabe had been shot dead during a post office robbery in 1996 by thugs who claimed they were members of the IRA, even though the IRA was on ceasefire at the time.  Seventeen bullets were fired in two bursts.  Four men were convicted and are currently serving sentences of up to fourteen years.  

Last September, Sinn Féin published in its weekly newspaper An Phoblacht the photo in question, taken within Castlerea Prison (but unfortunately I have been unable to locate a copy to share with you).  

Mr Morgan quickly responded to Mr Ward by saying the real question should be, “Why are the prisoners convicted of involvement in the tragic events that led to the death of Garda McCabe still in jail, when they should have been released a long time ago, under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement ?” 

That's where I stepped in with an innocent question.  Is that clumsy phrase in red a new Sinn Féin euphemism for “convicted killers” ? 

The debate then shifted to the airwaves, or tried to.  Mr Morgan refused to come on air to defend his words fearing he would be “ambushed”.  Three other Sinn Fein TDs likewise refused to come on air.  From slaughtering Garda McCabe, the discussion moved to the ethics of the IRA's blowing up of Lord Mountbatten in 1979 together with an old lady and two young boys.  Other ex-IRA Shinners made verbose attempts 

It went on for three days.  The level of Irish fury at IRA behaviour and Sinn Féin dissembling was extraordinary.  I've never heard anything like it.  

Sinn Féin needs to keep well out of such public discussions in the future if it doesn't want to be heavily punished in the polls.  

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Trilateral EU Meetings Upset Others

On 10th October 2001, Belgium in its role as EU President, hosted a summit of EU leaders at Ghent.  But Romano Prodi, Silvio Berlusconi and others took great offence when Jacques Chirac set up a private one-hour pre-meeting with Gerhard Schroeder and Tony Blair to discuss Afghanistan.  It was unprecedented for such a meeting of EU leaders to take place outside the framework of the EU.  

Then just three weeks later, even more umbrage was caused when Tony Blair invited Messrs Chirac and Schroeder to 10 Downing Street for a private little dinner party for further talks about ejecting the ruling Taliban out of Afghanistan.  

Mr Berlusconi and Spain's José María Aznar wondered why they were being excluded, considering the earlier row.  “Oh, all right then,” Tony Blair eventually told them, “you can come to my dinner party too”.  

Not good enough.  Hours before the aperitifs were served and the hors d'oeuvres hit the table, Guy Verhofstad, prime minister of Belgium which then held the EU presidency and - oddly - the EU's “High Representative” Javier Solana demanded an invitation, so they got one too.  So, at short notice, poor Cherie had to increase the seating arrangement from a cosy three to a bad-tempered seven.  And still the other non-invited EU leaders were grumbling.  

How then was Gerhard Shroeder able last week to assemble the same Big Three Cabal that had got Jacques Chirac and Tony Blair into hot water, with barely a squeak out of the rest of the EU, nor even EU President Bertie Ahern of Ireland, today's EU President ?  Maybe because no food and drink was involved.  

But the others have made it clear that they have absolutely no intention of implementing any of the bright ideas about competitiveness dreamt up by the Cabal.   So there.  

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Gay Marriage

The case against gay marriage is based on the axiom that marriage is the union of a man with a woman.  To extend it to same-sex unions would “undermine” the “sacred institution” of true marriage. 

The case for is anti-discrimination.  If straights can marry each other why not gays? And if gays commit to each other through marriage, it would surely reduce undesirable promiscuity amongst gays, while in no way affect a single marriage of the man-woman variety.  

Where to go from here ?

First, the “sacred institution” is already grievously undermined – by heterosexuals.  For what other function has divorce?  And the more liberal the divorce laws, the more undermined is marriage.  There is great entertainment in Britney Spears’ 55-hour marriage and Zsa Zsa Gabor’s eight, not to mention Henry VIII’s six which started it all (in the English-speaking world anyway).  But these and countless other examples of a frivolous approach to marriage all serve to undermine its central tenet – that it should be an inviolable union “until death do us part”.  With easy divorce available on demand, we can therefore – unless constrained by religious beliefs – go into marriage in a much more relaxed state of mind than if it were a real life sentence.  

And for a further “undermining” of marriage, just think how in France you can even marry a corpse, which of course begs the question does it only dissolve when the second partner dies?  (Or, indeed, when the corpse dissolves.)

Thus, there is surely a case for having two discrete institutions.  

Each type of union would attract the same civil advantages of marriage, such as tax breaks, inheritance rights, hospital visitation rights etc.  But the civil union would permit people with doubts to be more honest in their vows. 

Now for the gays. 

Reserving marriage for man-woman unions (excluding corpses and animals) is not actually discriminatory.  

This may sound pedantic, uncompassionate, unreasonable, but it's not discriminatory. 

Under a two-union regime, the more flexible civil union would be open to same-sex couples, though not marriage.  This would take care of all the factors, real or imagined, that undermine traditional marriage. 

In the longer term, as society becomes more accustomed to the concept of gay civil unions, people may see that gays would not be undermining traditional marriage, and that many are opting for lifetime durations - and sticking to them.  In that case, it will be time to re-consider whether marriage be opened to gays after all. 

But it is too much of a leap to do so in one fell swoop today.  It is more pressing to re-establish marriage as a sacred institution for those who want it. 

Late Note (January 2008): Over the following three years or so, I changed my position somewhat.  Like, totally.  Have a look at “Recognizing Non-Marital Unions”, which I posted in November 2007 and my newspaper column and discussion which followed this.

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John Kerry's Accidental Heroics

We’ve heard the stories.  George Bush is a faithful deserter; John Kerry is an adulterous war hero.  Mark Steyn picks the two “scandals” apart in a scabrous piece. 

But let’s have a closer look at the war hero part.  

Where Mr Bush wangled himself into the Texas Air National Guard and became a fighter pilot, Mr Kerry volunteered for Vietnam service in 1966, which was very patriotic, courageous and creditable.  However by volunteering instead of waiting to be drafted, Mr Kerry was allowed to choose his service.  He chose the US Navy, where only pilots were seeing much combat and he wasn’t a pilot.  Moreover it positioned him to try for officer candidate school, a cinch for a Yale graduate.  All in all, an excellent Vietnam survival plan. 

According to “Tour of Duty: John Kerry and the Vietnam War”, he spent his first few months of duty serving on a ship offshore, the frigate USS Gridley, far from the reach of the Vietcong.  By the time he was an officer, he asked in 1968 for the command of one of the small aluminium vessels, so-called “Swift” boats, that were confined to doing uneventful (and safe) Coast Guard patrol duty off Vietnam. 

But it was his bad luck that a few weeks later the mission changed, and the Swifts were sent perilously up Vietnamese rivers into the heart of the enemy, essentially to draw its fire. So it was that Mr Kerry saw action, largely against enemy (and sometimes civilian) junks.  In fairness he distinguished himself in combat, earning a Silver Star, a Bronze Star and three Purple Hearts.  He was also wounded, which qualified him for an early trip home, which he gratefully took.

Mr Kerry is to be admired for his undoubted heroics under fire, but it is relevant to point out that he faced action despite every effort he made to avoid it, and he then bailed out at the earliest opportunity. 

He was an accidental hero. 

Meanwhile, Mr Bush’s own Vietnam survival plan had him flying F102 fighter planes all over Texas and keeping the Mexican Airforce at bay.  Though he was no hero and faced no combat, last week’s piece below – “Baa Baa Two Bags Full” – suggests that even his war was not all beer and skittles.  Though by all accounts there was plenty of beer. 

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Achievement by Arithmetic

From a strictly arithmetical viewpoint It goes like this:

What makes one hundred percent ? 

What does it mean to give MORE than 100% ? Ever wonder about those people who say they are giving more than 100% ? We have all been to those meetings where someone wants you to give over 100%.  How about achieving 103% ? What makes up 100% in life ?

Here's a little arithmetical formula (thanks, Zeynap) that might help you answer these questions:

If:

is represented as: 

Then:

K-N-O-W-L-E-D-G-E becomes

11+14+15+23+12+5+4+7+5 = 96%,

and

H-A-R-D-W-O-R-K

8+1+18+4+23+15+18+11 = 98%,

But,

A-T-T-I-T-U-D-E

1+20+20+9+20+21+4+5 = 100%, 

And,

B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T

2+21+12+12+19+8+9+20 = 103%.

AND HEY, look how far ass kissing will take you.

A-S-S-K-I-S-S-I-N-G becomes

1+19+19+11+9+19+19+9+14+7 = 118%. 

So, one can then conclude with mathematical certainty that while 

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Quote of the Week

Quote : “Objects in your mirror may be closer than they appear.”

John Edwards, the only remaining serious challenger 
to frontrunner John Kerry,
and the candidate the Republicans fear most,
reminds Mr Kerry in Wisconsin t
hat his 40%-to-34% lead is only slender

[162]    Back to Index

ISSUE #67 - 15th February 2004 [112]

Journalism During the Iraq War

I attended a seminar recently on ethics in the media, and found particularly interesting the concluding talk by Richard Downes, a foreign correspondent with Ireland’s state broadcaster RTÉ, who covered the Iraq war from Baghdad.  “Embedded or In Bed – The Search for Truth in  War”, but since it won’t be published for some months, let me share some key points. 

There were three principle categories of Western reporter in the lead-up to and during the war

1. Those in Baghdad working for juggernauts like the BBC, CNN, Reuters, ITN, Fox, Sky

2. Those in Baghdad working for minor broadcasters or freelancing

3. Those embedded and travelling with either the US or British forces

He contrasted the role and freedom of the three categories. 

Not only were Category 1, because of their prominence, monitored by better-quality Iraqi minders.  But their 24/7 rolling news format, with live dispatches every 15 or 30 minutes, meant they could never leave the hotel, even for an hour, which necessarily restricted their ability to gather good quality data. 

Conversely, Mr Downes and his ilk in Category 2 could roam fairly freely, tell lies to their minders, evade them from time to time, hide proscribed broadcasting equipment, and thus see and talk to ordinary Baghdadis.  This enabled more of the human stories to emerge, such as a mini-epidemic of gastro-enteritis that broke out days before the war, just when hospitals were closing down and staff leaving for fear of what was to come. 

Nevertheless, Iraqi minders made special effort to keep reporters from seeing bomb damage in Baghdad, especially in the early stages of the war.  However, as the war progressed and they began to see the writing on the wall, those minders eased their draconian control and eventually slipped away back to their families.  

The world of the Category 3 embeds was very different again.  There were 777 of them, including - interestingly – one French crew embedded with the US forces.  Wearing the same fatigues as the soldiers, eating and sleeping among them, the embeds got to see real front-line action, but then were severely constrained by the Military in what they could report.  Each had been required to sign up to a stringent set of ground rules, with the sanction of being sent home (“terminated”) should they disobey them.  (The US Military have made the rules available online as a 48kb pdf file here, but in such a difficult format that I have transcribed the document into a more reader-friendly version in htm here.) 

On first reading, the ground rules suggest a rather liberal regime.  However, everything broadcast was subject to clearance by the unit commander, and he was not generous.&n