i propose to axiomatize evil, the better to understand it and thereby squelch it.
1. axiom of choice: we choose whether or not to do evil.
2. axiom of plenitude: there's plenty of potential evil.
3. axiom of intensionality: no matter how good we are, there is evil within us.
4. axiom of interference: our perceived self-interest interferes with our ability to judge what is evil.
as i have not been able to prove completeness in this theory, it's possible that more axioms will need to be added.
Showing posts with label left-wing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label left-wing. Show all posts
3/16/08
9/16/07
holy fucking shit
it's being reported that the university of st. thomas (the one in st. paul, minnesota) cancelled a talk by archbishop desmond tutu in response to false allegations of anti-semitism. if this is true, it is consistent with an accelerated trend of attacks on the leftist presence in academia and academic fora by the extreme right. here's a recap of some of the latest.
- erwin chemerinsky, one of the leading constitutional scholars in the US, was offered the deanship of the new law school at UC irvine, and accepted about a week before the offer was revoked. the evidence strongly suggests that it was behind-the-scenes campaigning by right-wing lawyers not affiliated with the university that led to the offer being withdrawn. it now appears likely, in part to to the outrage expressed by law faculty of all political stripes, that the offer will be reinstated and the chancellor of the irvine campus might have to leave instead.
- norman finkelstein was denied tenure at depaul, despite being unquestionably qualified. he had been the target of a campaign led by alan dershowitz, an academic of much fame but no distinction, whose writings in finkelstein's field - the history and politics of the israel-palestine conflict - are utterly idiotic. the evidence suggests that it was political pressure from outsiders that led to depaul's decision. mehrene larudee, another depaul faculty member considered for tenure (and a umass alum), was denied tenure as well. She, too, was considered a strong academic and a slam-dunk for tenure, but as a strong supporter of finkelstein she too was undoubtedly targeted for denial of tenure for reasons other than merit. finkelstein was later denied the customary year of teaching that follows tenure denial, ostensibly - but not especially plausibly - for conduct issues. He recently reached a settlement with the depaul administration and resigned.
- ward churchill, a leading native american scholar and a tenured professor at the university of
colorado boulder, was fired, ostensibly for academic misconduct. it is well-understood, however, that he was in reality fired because of a fascist campaign.
- andrew card, a man closely associated with the war crimes of the bush regime was awarded an honorary degree at the umass amherst commencement last may. there is no direct evidence of this being the result of a right-wing campaign, but it is a plausible hypothesis, given that he has no accomplishments to speak of, and umass leaders would have understood very well the loss of credibility that comes with honoring terrorists like card.
- brandeis university invited jimmy carter to speak about israeli apartheid - but only if torture enthusiast alan dershowitz was allowed a rebuttal. eventually, they relented somewhat, allowing separate but consecutive talks.
UPDATE (Oct. 10): st. thomas reversed its earlier decision. apparently the attack on tutu was too much even for the extremists at the ADL.
- erwin chemerinsky, one of the leading constitutional scholars in the US, was offered the deanship of the new law school at UC irvine, and accepted about a week before the offer was revoked. the evidence strongly suggests that it was behind-the-scenes campaigning by right-wing lawyers not affiliated with the university that led to the offer being withdrawn. it now appears likely, in part to to the outrage expressed by law faculty of all political stripes, that the offer will be reinstated and the chancellor of the irvine campus might have to leave instead.
- norman finkelstein was denied tenure at depaul, despite being unquestionably qualified. he had been the target of a campaign led by alan dershowitz, an academic of much fame but no distinction, whose writings in finkelstein's field - the history and politics of the israel-palestine conflict - are utterly idiotic. the evidence suggests that it was political pressure from outsiders that led to depaul's decision. mehrene larudee, another depaul faculty member considered for tenure (and a umass alum), was denied tenure as well. She, too, was considered a strong academic and a slam-dunk for tenure, but as a strong supporter of finkelstein she too was undoubtedly targeted for denial of tenure for reasons other than merit. finkelstein was later denied the customary year of teaching that follows tenure denial, ostensibly - but not especially plausibly - for conduct issues. He recently reached a settlement with the depaul administration and resigned.
- ward churchill, a leading native american scholar and a tenured professor at the university of
colorado boulder, was fired, ostensibly for academic misconduct. it is well-understood, however, that he was in reality fired because of a fascist campaign.
- andrew card, a man closely associated with the war crimes of the bush regime was awarded an honorary degree at the umass amherst commencement last may. there is no direct evidence of this being the result of a right-wing campaign, but it is a plausible hypothesis, given that he has no accomplishments to speak of, and umass leaders would have understood very well the loss of credibility that comes with honoring terrorists like card.
- brandeis university invited jimmy carter to speak about israeli apartheid - but only if torture enthusiast alan dershowitz was allowed a rebuttal. eventually, they relented somewhat, allowing separate but consecutive talks.
UPDATE (Oct. 10): st. thomas reversed its earlier decision. apparently the attack on tutu was too much even for the extremists at the ADL.
8/6/07
funny video of the month
this schoolhouse rock-style version of pirates and emperors is really well-done. i have just one complaint, and that's that they use "thug" too much.
7/29/07
humiliating work and the law
i'm trying to think through some issues raised by wilson v. monarch paper co., 939 f.2d 1138 (5th cir. 1991) and similar cases. in this case, a jury found, and the court system upheld, that a vice president of a company was entitled to millions of dollars in compensation for intentional infliction of emotional distress after being demoted to warehouse janitor. this raises many questions and thoughts that i'd like to explore in this post, and presumably return to as i think about it more. i guess for now i'll put things in point form, since my thoughts are scattered.
- intentional infliction of emotional distress is not an easy kind of case to win, because the standards for abuse are pretty high. in wilson, the required standard was that the offending conduct be so outrageous that civilized society should not tolerate it.
- how widespread is the attitude that it is humiliating to be a janitor? do janitors think so? if not, are they simply in denial, or was the jury wrong?
- or is it a situation where the jury believed that the former vice president would have mistakenly believed that it is humiliating to be a janitor, either because of his idiosyncratic personal beliefs or because of the beliefs prevalent in his social class? it seems unlikely that a jury would find IIED and a judge would uphold it based on beliefs particular to an individual or class, unless it is a class belief shared by the judge and the majority of the jury.
- just what is it, anyway, that makes it humiliating for someone to be a janitor? are the factors purely social or is there something innate to humans that makes such work inherently humiliating?
- if, as i assume, the humiliation of being a janitor is entirely or primarily a social fact, why is such a social fact constructed? and why is a remedy for this humiliation offered in the narrow circumstances of executive demotion, but not in the broader setting of a society that assigns some people humiliating jobs on a career basis? in other words, how does the view that civilized society cannot tolerate the demotion of an executive to janitor reconcile with the fact that the same (presumably) civilized society assigns many people to be career janitors? what does this tell us about the relationship between law and society?
- all this assumes that what the jury found to be humiliating was the job itself, not, say, the fact that the person was forcibly transferred from one job to another, or the fact that someone was removed from a lucrative job. this seems to be borne out: we can safely assume that no jury would find emotional distress for someone who was transferred from janitor to VP, if the judge even allowed the case to proceed to a jury; and the law makes it perfectly permissible to fire a high-level employee for no good reason - certainly it's not considered outrageous conduct.
- one conclusion that can be drawn is that in the eyes of the law, it is much better for a vice president to be fired than to be forced to choose between working as a janitor and quitting, which is always an option. can the conclusion also be drawn that it is better for people in general to not work at all than to work as a janitor? advocates of "welfare reform" suggest that it is more dignified to do any work than to do no work at all. but if this is true, why is it abusive to make a vice president choose between working as a janitor or quitting, but not abusive to simply fire him?
- one possible answer is that we believe in meritocracy: it is not unconscionable to have a society in which some people are forced to have humiliating jobs, because our society allows the individual some agency in determining his or her ultimate circumstances: people who are meritorious (by some definition that we need not look into right now) are rewarded with non-humiliating jobs, while those who are not meritorious must accept humiliating jobs. what is abusive is to improperly assign a meritorious person like wilson to a humiliating job.
- the problem with this is that it is very widely recognized that whatever role merit plays in determining one's job prospects, it is far from the only factor, and circumstances of birth are a major determinant of whether or not one will end up in a humiliating job. and while this fact is lamented among liberals, it is tolerated by them, while illiberals seem to have no problem with it. would such illiberals on a jury not have found for wilson? or is this further confirmation that reactionaries lack analytical and/or moral intelligence?
- intentional infliction of emotional distress is not an easy kind of case to win, because the standards for abuse are pretty high. in wilson, the required standard was that the offending conduct be so outrageous that civilized society should not tolerate it.
- how widespread is the attitude that it is humiliating to be a janitor? do janitors think so? if not, are they simply in denial, or was the jury wrong?
- or is it a situation where the jury believed that the former vice president would have mistakenly believed that it is humiliating to be a janitor, either because of his idiosyncratic personal beliefs or because of the beliefs prevalent in his social class? it seems unlikely that a jury would find IIED and a judge would uphold it based on beliefs particular to an individual or class, unless it is a class belief shared by the judge and the majority of the jury.
- just what is it, anyway, that makes it humiliating for someone to be a janitor? are the factors purely social or is there something innate to humans that makes such work inherently humiliating?
- if, as i assume, the humiliation of being a janitor is entirely or primarily a social fact, why is such a social fact constructed? and why is a remedy for this humiliation offered in the narrow circumstances of executive demotion, but not in the broader setting of a society that assigns some people humiliating jobs on a career basis? in other words, how does the view that civilized society cannot tolerate the demotion of an executive to janitor reconcile with the fact that the same (presumably) civilized society assigns many people to be career janitors? what does this tell us about the relationship between law and society?
- all this assumes that what the jury found to be humiliating was the job itself, not, say, the fact that the person was forcibly transferred from one job to another, or the fact that someone was removed from a lucrative job. this seems to be borne out: we can safely assume that no jury would find emotional distress for someone who was transferred from janitor to VP, if the judge even allowed the case to proceed to a jury; and the law makes it perfectly permissible to fire a high-level employee for no good reason - certainly it's not considered outrageous conduct.
- one conclusion that can be drawn is that in the eyes of the law, it is much better for a vice president to be fired than to be forced to choose between working as a janitor and quitting, which is always an option. can the conclusion also be drawn that it is better for people in general to not work at all than to work as a janitor? advocates of "welfare reform" suggest that it is more dignified to do any work than to do no work at all. but if this is true, why is it abusive to make a vice president choose between working as a janitor or quitting, but not abusive to simply fire him?
- one possible answer is that we believe in meritocracy: it is not unconscionable to have a society in which some people are forced to have humiliating jobs, because our society allows the individual some agency in determining his or her ultimate circumstances: people who are meritorious (by some definition that we need not look into right now) are rewarded with non-humiliating jobs, while those who are not meritorious must accept humiliating jobs. what is abusive is to improperly assign a meritorious person like wilson to a humiliating job.
- the problem with this is that it is very widely recognized that whatever role merit plays in determining one's job prospects, it is far from the only factor, and circumstances of birth are a major determinant of whether or not one will end up in a humiliating job. and while this fact is lamented among liberals, it is tolerated by them, while illiberals seem to have no problem with it. would such illiberals on a jury not have found for wilson? or is this further confirmation that reactionaries lack analytical and/or moral intelligence?
7/25/07
investigation of the plagiarism charges against ward churchill
tom mayer, a sociologist at the university of colorado boulder, has investigated the plagiarism allegations against ward churchill and found them to be "superannuated, unproven, substantively inconsequential, and either wrongheaded or misdirected."
the conclusion to his report is worth reading for its exposition of the moral cowardice of liberals - at least most of the liberals who prof. mayer has discussed the churchill affair with. those who observe the political scene will not be surprised. nor will they be surprised that the fascists who support the witch hunt deluged mayer with vulgar and inarticulate hate mail. as liberals are cowards, so are fascists idiots. the full text of the conclusion is below.
the conclusion to his report is worth reading for its exposition of the moral cowardice of liberals - at least most of the liberals who prof. mayer has discussed the churchill affair with. those who observe the political scene will not be surprised. nor will they be surprised that the fascists who support the witch hunt deluged mayer with vulgar and inarticulate hate mail. as liberals are cowards, so are fascists idiots. the full text of the conclusion is below.
Procedural fairness in modern jurisprudence requires that accusation, formal charging, decisions about evidence, and imposition of penalties should be clearly separated. This has not happened in the case of Ward Churchill. The CU administration, usually in the person of Provost Philip DiStefano, has functioned as Churchill’s accuser, grand jury, tribunal selector, and sentencing judge. This concatenation of roles makes it easy for political motivations to penetrate the process of adjudication. While a charade of academic due process has been maintained, the treatment of Ward Churchill strongly resembles a political lynching. The plagiarism charges against Professor Churchill are superannuated, unproven, substantively inconsequential, and either wrongheaded or misdirected. His reputation as a scholar has suffered egregiously and unjustifiably as a consequence.
Due to my own involvement in his defense, I have talked to many people about the Ward Churchill affair. Most of these interactions have been disheartening to say the least. Among other things, I have received a considerable number of hate letters and e-mails characterized mainly by inarticulate rage and vulgarity. More discouraging, however, is the response of many purported liberals who claim to support academic freedom and who know something about the history of McCarthyism. Usually these individuals are completely unfamiliar with Churchill’s work and misunderstand the “little Eichmanns” phrase that is reiterated ad nauseam in the media. Knowing that a panel of reputable academics has found him guilty of plagiarism, all concern for academic freedom vanishes and my liberal interlocutors often express contempt for Churchill and support draconian penalties. They fear that the reputation of liberalism might suffer from support of a proven plagiarizer. They recoil from thinking that a panel of reputable academics could be swayed by private animosity or the prevailing political climate. Only with the greatest reluctance do these purported liberals consider contrary arguments or evidence. During these interactions I become painfully aware of how profoundly both Professor Churchill and freedom of critical thought have been wounded by this politically inspired inquisition. A just monetary compensation for Ward Churchill would be very expensive indeed. The damage to freedom of thought may be irreparable in the near future.
academy fights: round 2 to the fascists
in june, professor norman finkelstein was denied tenure by depaul university thanks to a concerted effort by alan dershowitz. today, the university of colorado fired tenured professor ward churchill thanks to an effort by the horowitz-ACTA crowd.
i remember long ago reading an essay by stephen king in which he instructed his readers how to act when they've heard of a case of censorship: to immediately get the censored material and read it. censorship usually targets interesting and relevant ideas. finkelstein and churchill have not been censored, but they have been punished for their political views by a system that is supposed to reward intellectual accomplishment and protect the academy from political intimidation. for the enemies of critical thought, actual censorship is not a viable short-term goal, so they are instead making inroads into a more manageable goal: distorting academic debate by intimidating faculty who are independent-minded and critical in tone.
in the case of finkelstein and churchill, i happen to have read extensively of both of their works, and i recommend them without reservation. they are two of the sharpest analytical minds that i've ever read, and they both write clearly and engagingly on important topics. it is partly for these reasons that they are being targeted by the enemies of intellect. for these reasons i suggest that the appropriate response to this particular attack on critical thinking is to read these authors.
neither decision was plausible on its merits. in finkelstein's case, there was no pretense of applying the universal standards for tenure - quality of teaching and research. he was denied tenure for his "tone". if this seems like a subjective non-standard, that's because it is. he was denied tenure because conservatives don't like what he writes, and because twice he's made the conservative intellectual establishment look very, very foolish. first as a graduate student, by exposing joan peters' anti-palestinian propaganda tome "from time immemorial" as a fraud; then by demonstrating the extraordinary stupidity and absence of merit in alan dershowitz's anti-palestinian book "the case for israel".
in churchill's case, there was a pretense of applying a reasonable standard - he was accused of research misconduct. but the pretense is transparent. the president of the university who recommended his termination is a right-wing ideologue who belongs to ACTA, a highly ideological group, founded by lynne cheney and joe lieberman, dedicated to opposing critical thinking in the academy about history and politics. when it became public knowledge a few years ago that churchill had written a highly inflammatory essay about 9-11, the university president promised to subject churchill's writings to an extraordinary level of scrutiny, and convened a committee that did so. in a report that is itself subject to complaints of misconduct (but has not been investigated), the committee concluded that churchill had plagiarized and falsified information relating to native american history, though not in any scholarly writing. the faculty panel charged with making a recommendation recommended against dismissing prof. churchill. as prof. gary leupp has suggested, if "boards of regents in this country were to investigate and punish the falsification of Native American history by scholars, or if society in general were to investigate such falsification in the media, popular culture and political discourse, we’d all be in for a very time-consuming process resulting in a whole lot of people out of jobs." the president, however, overruled the faculty's recommendation and recommended dismissal to the university's board of regents, which rubber-stamped his recommendation 8-1, with no public debate.
these attacks on the academy can't be seen separately from the ascendancy of fascism generally, including the bush administration's war on civil liberties, the erosion of institutions and laws intended to protect us from centralized power, and the increasing concentration of wealth and centralization of power, in this country and worldwide. follow my recommendation, do yourself and the world a favor, and read finkelstein and churchill.
i remember long ago reading an essay by stephen king in which he instructed his readers how to act when they've heard of a case of censorship: to immediately get the censored material and read it. censorship usually targets interesting and relevant ideas. finkelstein and churchill have not been censored, but they have been punished for their political views by a system that is supposed to reward intellectual accomplishment and protect the academy from political intimidation. for the enemies of critical thought, actual censorship is not a viable short-term goal, so they are instead making inroads into a more manageable goal: distorting academic debate by intimidating faculty who are independent-minded and critical in tone.
in the case of finkelstein and churchill, i happen to have read extensively of both of their works, and i recommend them without reservation. they are two of the sharpest analytical minds that i've ever read, and they both write clearly and engagingly on important topics. it is partly for these reasons that they are being targeted by the enemies of intellect. for these reasons i suggest that the appropriate response to this particular attack on critical thinking is to read these authors.
neither decision was plausible on its merits. in finkelstein's case, there was no pretense of applying the universal standards for tenure - quality of teaching and research. he was denied tenure for his "tone". if this seems like a subjective non-standard, that's because it is. he was denied tenure because conservatives don't like what he writes, and because twice he's made the conservative intellectual establishment look very, very foolish. first as a graduate student, by exposing joan peters' anti-palestinian propaganda tome "from time immemorial" as a fraud; then by demonstrating the extraordinary stupidity and absence of merit in alan dershowitz's anti-palestinian book "the case for israel".
in churchill's case, there was a pretense of applying a reasonable standard - he was accused of research misconduct. but the pretense is transparent. the president of the university who recommended his termination is a right-wing ideologue who belongs to ACTA, a highly ideological group, founded by lynne cheney and joe lieberman, dedicated to opposing critical thinking in the academy about history and politics. when it became public knowledge a few years ago that churchill had written a highly inflammatory essay about 9-11, the university president promised to subject churchill's writings to an extraordinary level of scrutiny, and convened a committee that did so. in a report that is itself subject to complaints of misconduct (but has not been investigated), the committee concluded that churchill had plagiarized and falsified information relating to native american history, though not in any scholarly writing. the faculty panel charged with making a recommendation recommended against dismissing prof. churchill. as prof. gary leupp has suggested, if "boards of regents in this country were to investigate and punish the falsification of Native American history by scholars, or if society in general were to investigate such falsification in the media, popular culture and political discourse, we’d all be in for a very time-consuming process resulting in a whole lot of people out of jobs." the president, however, overruled the faculty's recommendation and recommended dismissal to the university's board of regents, which rubber-stamped his recommendation 8-1, with no public debate.
these attacks on the academy can't be seen separately from the ascendancy of fascism generally, including the bush administration's war on civil liberties, the erosion of institutions and laws intended to protect us from centralized power, and the increasing concentration of wealth and centralization of power, in this country and worldwide. follow my recommendation, do yourself and the world a favor, and read finkelstein and churchill.
7/23/07
7/18/07
happy 89th to nelson mandela!
here's a few music videos in his honor. reportedly mr. mandela is a great admirer of paul robeson; so are the manics. i hope he likes them too.
manic street preachers: let robeson sing
DAM: born here
immortal technique: the 4th branch
manic street preachers: let robeson sing
DAM: born here
immortal technique: the 4th branch
6/16/07
the finkelstein/larudee affair
depaul's denial of tenure to profs. finkelstein and larudee is becoming a cause beyond just middle eastern studies and political science circles. many academics are questioning the motivations behind depaul's decision, connecting it not just to the traditional suppression of points of view critical of israel, but to the right-wing attack on academic inquiry more generally.
http://normanfinkelstein.wordpress.com/
many have pointed out that depaul's decision meshes with the level of intolerance in the western mainstream for those taking a critical approach to the israel-palestine conflict. less remarked upon is the factor that noam chomsky emphasized in "the fate of an honest intellectual." chomsky describes how twenty years ago, when finkelstein was a graduate student at princeton, he exposed the large segment of american intelligentsia which had been very publicly enamoured of joan peters' "from time immemorial" as being very foolish for being so uncritically accepting of a massive fraud. since chomsky's interview, finkelstein publicly outed dershowitz as a dreadfully bad propagandist.
underlying the whole issue of "tone of scholarship" seems to be the disturbing idea that dissident scholarship can be tolerated to an extent, as long as it's polite; if your work, however, doesn't just argue that the conventional view is wrong, but that the conventional view is idiotic and not worth serious consideration, the guardians of the idiot convention will come gunning for you and the merits of your scholarship will not protect you. it might be a useful study to check up on the "tone" of academics who criticize literature at the scholarly and moral level of dershowitz's writings on israel, but less politically popular, like maybe holocaust denial or apologetics for al-qaeda.
another suspicion i have is that there's funny business going on behind the scenes. a university doesn't just deny tenure to an world-renowned and unquestionably qualified scholar based on discredited accusations made by an outsider, even if the outsider is a celebrity and the scholar is a lightning rod for controversy. it even more certainly does not deny tenure to another qualified scholar who is not especially controversial but stands up and supports a controversial professor against the university. presumably the leadership of depaul is not stupid, and knows that its decisions would lead to a serious loss of reputation in the academic world. based on this i'm guessing that depaul was secretly promised some large amount of money, perhaps by a right-wing foundation, to get rid of finkelstein and larudee.
http://normanfinkelstein.w
many have pointed out that depaul's decision meshes with the level of intolerance in the western mainstream for those taking a critical approach to the israel-palestine conflict. less remarked upon is the factor that noam chomsky emphasized in "the fate of an honest intellectual." chomsky describes how twenty years ago, when finkelstein was a graduate student at princeton, he exposed the large segment of american intelligentsia which had been very publicly enamoured of joan peters' "from time immemorial" as being very foolish for being so uncritically accepting of a massive fraud. since chomsky's interview, finkelstein publicly outed dershowitz as a dreadfully bad propagandist.
underlying the whole issue of "tone of scholarship" seems to be the disturbing idea that dissident scholarship can be tolerated to an extent, as long as it's polite; if your work, however, doesn't just argue that the conventional view is wrong, but that the conventional view is idiotic and not worth serious consideration, the guardians of the idiot convention will come gunning for you and the merits of your scholarship will not protect you. it might be a useful study to check up on the "tone" of academics who criticize literature at the scholarly and moral level of dershowitz's writings on israel, but less politically popular, like maybe holocaust denial or apologetics for al-qaeda.
another suspicion i have is that there's funny business going on behind the scenes. a university doesn't just deny tenure to an world-renowned and unquestionably qualified scholar based on discredited accusations made by an outsider, even if the outsider is a celebrity and the scholar is a lightning rod for controversy. it even more certainly does not deny tenure to another qualified scholar who is not especially controversial but stands up and supports a controversial professor against the university. presumably the leadership of depaul is not stupid, and knows that its decisions would lead to a serious loss of reputation in the academic world. based on this i'm guessing that depaul was secretly promised some large amount of money, perhaps by a right-wing foundation, to get rid of finkelstein and larudee.
4/18/07
petras and finkelstein debate american support for israel
there's a great discussion over here regarding the causes of american "support for israel". no raving zionist loons, just two leftist intellectuals having a serious conversation. if one had to characterize the sides, petras takes the position that the influence of the israeli lobby is decisive, while finkelstein maintains that coincidence of american and israeli elite interests is more significant. hagit borer, kickass linguist and member of KPFA's SWANA collective, attempts to moderate.
4/17/07
3/31/07
two from counterpunch
time for some lazy reposting.
alan maass discusses the connection between oil and imperialist warfare in oil and empire. he first describes how
elsewhere on the counterpunch website, cockburn and st. clair take apart the "antiwar" senate vote.
alan maass discusses the connection between oil and imperialist warfare in oil and empire. he first describes how
even saudi arabia is furious, with king abdullah denouncing the occupation of iraq and turning down dinner invitations from his white house buddies. (we'll see how long that lasts.) maass goes on to give an overview of the geopolitical significance of oil of the kind that ought to be familiar to politically literate people. you know, that 2% or so of americans.[t]he cabinet of the new Iraqi government... approved a law that would undo Iraq's nationalized system and give Western oil giants unparalleled access to the country's vast reserves.
The oil companies would be guaranteed super-profits--on a scale unknown anywhere else in the Middle East--for a period of 20 to 35 years from oil pumped out of two-thirds or more of Iraq's oilfields.
elsewhere on the counterpunch website, cockburn and st. clair take apart the "antiwar" senate vote.
3/27/07
hillel tactics at G-dub
the forward is reporting on some sketchy tactics adopted by george washington university's hillel to prevent a discussion on israeli apartheid. this took place during a talk at the university by former president jimmy carter, who was speaking on the subject. robert fishman, GW hillel's director, admitted that he and a group of jewish students made a plan to sit near the microphone and rush to it at the end of the talk, ensuring that mostly critical questions from a pre-scripted sheet were asked. this was accomplished, with four students reading questions directly from the sheet - none of which directly addressed the issue of israeli apartheid.
is there anything wrong with this? according to one way of looking at it, not much. as a hillel activist pointed out, nobody stopped anyone from asking questions. at worst, the associated press got the false impression that the audience was mostly critical, and people who had honest questions in response to the talk didn't get to ask them because they didn't act quickly enough.
i bring up this story because it illustrates an unfortunate tendency in the "pro-israel" crowd* to want to stifle and/or avoid debate of substantive issues. this is true in general, and especially true of discussions of israeli apartheid. documentation of apartheid is generally met with substanceless attacks rather than substantive response. in fact, i don't know of any attempt to seriously reckon with the arguments of uri davis, edward herman, jeff halper, the national lawyers guild, or anyone else who has analyzed israeli apartheid**.
it's especially unfortunate that a chapter of hillel was involved in this. i'm not saying that hillel is always neutral when it comes to israel***, but it generally tries to preserve the appearance, at least, of openness to a range of political views, in keeping with its mission of increasing jewish involvement on campus in a nonsectarian way. having been involved with several hillels, i've known many jews who've been interested in "doing jewish", as hillel calls it, but were put off by its reputation as a predominantly right-wing institution. the kind of theatrics that the forward article describes doesn't help hillel overcome this reputation.
________
* i use scare quotes around "pro-israel" because i don't believe that supporters of/apologists for israeli violence, racism and political intransigence are genuinely pro-israel. i'll blog about it sometime.
** i'm leaving out jimmy carter because i haven't read his book. i've also seen false statements
about israeli apartheid attributed to him by the mainstream U.S. media, such as the claim that there is no racial discrimination in israel proper (i.e. israel within the 1949 armistice lines). such claims, which run contrary to the unrebutted research of some of the authors i've mentioned, cast doubts on his credibility.
*** at some point, god willing, i'll tell the story of hillel's deplorable conduct at a panel featuring jewish and israeli members of the international solidarity movement, which i helped to organize.
is there anything wrong with this? according to one way of looking at it, not much. as a hillel activist pointed out, nobody stopped anyone from asking questions. at worst, the associated press got the false impression that the audience was mostly critical, and people who had honest questions in response to the talk didn't get to ask them because they didn't act quickly enough.
i bring up this story because it illustrates an unfortunate tendency in the "pro-israel" crowd* to want to stifle and/or avoid debate of substantive issues. this is true in general, and especially true of discussions of israeli apartheid. documentation of apartheid is generally met with substanceless attacks rather than substantive response. in fact, i don't know of any attempt to seriously reckon with the arguments of uri davis, edward herman, jeff halper, the national lawyers guild, or anyone else who has analyzed israeli apartheid**.
it's especially unfortunate that a chapter of hillel was involved in this. i'm not saying that hillel is always neutral when it comes to israel***, but it generally tries to preserve the appearance, at least, of openness to a range of political views, in keeping with its mission of increasing jewish involvement on campus in a nonsectarian way. having been involved with several hillels, i've known many jews who've been interested in "doing jewish", as hillel calls it, but were put off by its reputation as a predominantly right-wing institution. the kind of theatrics that the forward article describes doesn't help hillel overcome this reputation.
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* i use scare quotes around "pro-israel" because i don't believe that supporters of/apologists for israeli violence, racism and political intransigence are genuinely pro-israel. i'll blog about it sometime.
** i'm leaving out jimmy carter because i haven't read his book. i've also seen false statements
about israeli apartheid attributed to him by the mainstream U.S. media, such as the claim that there is no racial discrimination in israel proper (i.e. israel within the 1949 armistice lines). such claims, which run contrary to the unrebutted research of some of the authors i've mentioned, cast doubts on his credibility.
*** at some point, god willing, i'll tell the story of hillel's deplorable conduct at a panel featuring jewish and israeli members of the international solidarity movement, which i helped to organize.
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