But if you can multi-task, good for you.

And for me, I can count on one finger all of the people I know who constantly hurl invectives at others--and I mean constantly. And I think I know which finger I'll use to make that count.

Regarding Ismail and his views on the Holocaust, just ask him, and don't forget to include all of the implications of the Holocaust. I asked him, and all I got was the usual thrown fruit he uses whenever he has to answer specific questions.

Maybe he's sane, but when he washes your windshield, don't tell him he missed a spot.

 

You know what I mean, you avoid it though.  Cleverly, you avoid it with insults, and not just to me, but everyone who disagrees with you. 

But, one more time.  This isn't a civil rights problem, this is a war--since everyone in the West Bank and Gaza keeps saying that it's a war.  Oh this is so complex. 

as politically correct comedy. 

Well, no, that's not what I was saying--regarding your first point. And second, did Obama say Auschwitz or not? The video is there. I just asked if all of these mistakes, and they are coming one after another, are starting to bother you. That's all.

Regarding your first post about the Armenian farmers. Sorry, but know-how alone is not what made the San Joaquin Valley more than a seasonal provider of food. Infrastructure did that--and I will bet you that the knowledge brought back to Armenia had to do as much with refrigeration as it did irrigation. Obama has used the argument--which means I'm not arguing with you, but I'm arguing with Obama's positions--that funding Iraq has taken money away from the US economy, money which could have been used to help the US infrastructure. That's his argument. So he's going to spend more in Afghanistan? And this is showing good judgment to you?

Well, yes, the Marshall plan worked very well. I have no problem with that. It took a lot of money, a lot of time, and quite a bit of human resources to work. So let's take our entrance into WWII and combine that with the years it took for the Marshall plan to be successful, and compare it to Iraq. What I see is a similar length of time by time it's all over, millions of fewer casualties. But it's going to go at the speed of human change. Or you can compare it to European colonization, which began with a war, followed by a period re acculturation, followed by the colony adapting to a capitalist/democratic model. That just seems to be the way things work. And in all of these endeavors there was an organized opposition. If you think that Obama can increase our presence in Afghanistan, build their infrastructure without Iran and the Wahabis and Bin Laden Inc. getting a teensy bit upset and organizing a 'resistance movement'--you can't believe that.

What is ironic is this quote from you:

The Taliban and other extremists in Afghanistan are a result partially of hopelessnes and poverty. If we help the Afghani people by giving them hope and helping them toward prosperity, we will be rewarded.

This is what Bush has been saying about Iraq. So, more questions, what part of the Iraq plan does Obama see as an exercise in bad judgment? Unless he is a dolt, it's got to be the speed with which Bush and Co. saw the transformation happening, all without resistance. There isn't anything else to object to--that also wouldn't be objectionable in Afghanistan.

So this is an answer to your above post, about the policy proposals of Obama. This is one of those policies that don't make any sense--given the parameters that Obama himself has laid out.

If you yourself want to argue different ways of bringing the Third World out of poverty, that's a completely different argument, and you might find, as usual, that we agree more than we disagree.

I see the Gateway Arch in your picture. In which areas of St. Louis would you prefer to be banned from living? The problem is more than neighbors not getting along. The problem is that those in the majority in the West Bank are persecuting all minorities in the living there, Christians as well as Jews. And it seems that the the majority West Bank population sees nothing wrong with killing and torturing the undesirables. Is that the way you treat Cubs fans?

This is a complex problem to say the least. But in Israel, there are no streets named after Baruch Goldstein, in the Jewish world he is not a hero. If the issue is one of tolerance, there is not a steady stream of media coverage and 'entertainment' focused on murdering the Arabs.

The fact that there are IDF soldiers whose task is to guard Arab homes from attacks says everything, because I doubt there are Fatah policemen given the task of guarding Jewish homes which don't even receive the luxury of being called homes by the western media and by many people throughout the world. The most those residents can hope for is to be called 'settlers' even though the land on which they live is under the sovereignty of their own government.

If I moved next to Cunetto's, would I be a new neighbor or a settler?

I've noticed this about your argumentative style, that you turn words into numbers, basically, and then deal with the relationships between those numbers.  Of course, if one has a style of looking for the essence of words and examining the relationship of the essences within the context of history--phenomenology, in other words, that's a long bridge to cross before those styles can actually converse.

But I can't help but be impressed regarding the symbols you can get out of these keyboards.   

I know that you're busy, but this would be the second time since I've been commenting here that you've promised to quickly some declaration of principles--not just a declaration of criticisms--into print.  And I was just wondering...not to be pushy...but just wondering when this tractate will emerge.  And I know that you not only have to print it but be there to clarify and maybe even defend it.  So it's a big project--in terms of time.

Poor Benjy.

 

Yes, I'll make the substitutions, although, it might be impossible, since the preserved food would have to be made from scratch.  And I knew it was the fire. 

And just to stay completely on topic, lest we have too many friendly moments, I've always wondered what kind of food the ancient Israelis would have invented had we not be tossed into exile only to return as has been promised in the prophecies.  That and music. 

 

Like or not, dude, we are entertainers now.  Remember, rock stars?

Anyway, what's there to talk about?  You said you couldn't figure out why Hamas has it in their charter, as does the PLO, to destroy Israel.  Now, why terrorist groups need a charter in the first place, that's a head scratcher.  But why they haven't figured out how to use an eraser--I think you've got to explain that.  Otherwise, we're just trading insults, and since you're not going to hire a writer, you may as well just give up.

Perhaps this is just a plateau, who knows?