CHARLES notes this from Daoud Kuttab - Has Israel’s Gaza Attack Revived Hamas?
JERUSALEM — In its efforts to stop amateur rockets from nagging the residents of some of its southern cities, Israel appears to have given new life to the fledging Islamic movement in Palestine.
Death by nagging
HAMAS in glass houses:
When Israel withdrew from Gaza they left behind a whole load of greenhouses and the like. These were wrecked by the denizens as symbols of Zionist oppression or some such. Now if instead the lokes had decided to take-up market gardening and not carry on with their amateur rocketry we wouldn’t be having our current difficulties in the Near East would we? If like every other nation on the planet they tried to make their way in the world by making things and providing services Gaza wouldn’t resemble the globe’s largest sink-estate and the inhabitants of Sderot wouldn’t need to be world-class at the “duck and cover method”. It’s win-win. Unfortunately Hamas has decided to bet the farm on lose-lose.
Sow. Reap…
LORD Elvis looks at Gordon Brown’s Blitz spirit:
Isn’t it great to see that the Government are tightening their belts at a time when thousands of people are losing their jobs or worrying about redundancy and making ends meet?
Well it would be if it were true. It wouldn’t be perfect, but it would be something. So what are we to make of the report in today’s London Standard
that Whitehall departments have spunked away £320,000 of taxpayers’ money on flat-screen TVs, DVD players and stereos?
The highest spender was Mandy’s Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform which somewho managed to spend £87,000 over the last three years on TVs and music equipment, whilst the Treasury managed to £42,000 on televisions, £25,000 on DVD players and £9,600 on hi-fis.
It’s a laugh, isn’t it? And you all thought ‘I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day’ was just a song, but for our Government it seems to be reality.
Of course, cathode ray tubes are out, and plasma is in. But still, good to see he’s not obsessed with spin…
Mathematician Dr David Leslie says Mariah Carey’s E=MC2 album shows she has misread the algebra”.
“The ‘two’ in the equation means C squared, not MC multiplied by two,” he explained. “The correct reading of the equation is E=MCC, so perhaps Mariah’s re-interpretation should have been ‘emancipation equals Mariah Carey Carey’?”
Answer: you don’t need to be good at maths to be rich…
SAYS Dame Edna Everage:
“Madonna is a creation, so perhaps we should give her and the factory that created her a little credit, but I think that she should quietly disappear now,” she says, benignly. “Poor Madge seems unable to decide whether she wants to look like Marilyn Monroe or Marlene Dietrich. Still, perhaps that’s the job of the retouchers… Really though, has she ever said anything interesting? And I’m not sure I approve of adoption when both parents are of the same sex.”
Said, like a virgin…
HOW Labour came undone:
It was breath-taking and depressing to observe the transformation of New Labour after 1997, from the party of open government, human rights and civil liberties into an increasingly paranoid group of power-hogging and repressive political control freaks, who have done more damage to fundamental human rights in the past 11 years than any other (sequence of) government(s) in any comparable-length stretch of time since the Glorious Revolution.
Just wait til Obama’s been in for a few years…
Says warmist Dave Bath:
Wouldn’t it be great if we could force all climate-change deniers and mitigation stallers to buy homes and make property investments a metre or less above current king tide levels.
Yes it would be great. A home on the beach… Dreamy…
There is also no use in expecting international understanding to last, despite the hints sent our way to that effect recently from both near and far. A single strike will not be condemned, and if so then only as lip service, but ten strikes will be - and harshly.
The world shows very little patience for the stronger side, and Israel is certainly that. Forbearance will quickly become exhausted, not only externally but internally as well. It is therefore not recommended to rely on the declarations of public servants and rank-and-file civilians who swear by “letting the IDF win,” giving it all the time in the world, and dealing with the Gaza problem “once and for all.”
Hard to win hearts and minds when lives are being lost…
THE Palestinians need to learn a lesson, right?
The indispensable Tom Segev, on teaching miltary lessons as a way to establish deterrence.
And here are some past examples of lessons taught and learned: Qibya, 1953, Samu’a, 1966, “Security borders,” 1967-73, Aerial bombing of Lebanon, 1974-5, Litani Operation, 1978, Lebanon War, 1982, “Iron Fist” suppression of Intifada, 1988, Operations Grapes of Wrath, 1995, Defensive Shield, 2002, Second Lebanon War, 2005.
ALL OF THESE operations have in common serious provocations from Palestinian and, after the extension of occupation to South Lebanon, Islamist insurgents; provocations including the loss of Israeli lives. The response of Israeli military professionals, in all cases, was that Israel’s response would have to be disproportionate; that the attack was coming because Israel was perceived as weak and needed to improve its deterrent power.
But in no cases did the Israeli attack deter further attack and in many cases it unleashed unanticipated violence, prompting new alliances against Israel which then led to new, more complex attacks, along with increasing diplomatic isolation.
New York Venture Capitalist, Fred Wilson blames the internet:
“Clearly the economic downturn is the direct cause of most of these failures but I believe it is the straw that broke the camel’s back in most cases. The internet, now closing in on 15 years old in its mainstream incarnation as the world wide web, is in many cases the underlying cause of these business failures. Bits of information flowing over a wire (or through the air) are just more efficient than physical infrastructure”
A virtual Woolworths?
Mark Steyn wonders about Obama’s plans:
Hey, that’s great news, isn’t it? After all, everyone knows Americans consume too much. What was it that then Sen. Obama said on the subject? “We can’t just keep driving our SUVs, eating whatever we want, keeping our homes at 72 degrees at all times regardless of whether we live in the tundra or the desert and keep consuming 25 percent of the world’s resources with just 4 percent of the world’s population, and expect the rest of the world to say, ‘You just go ahead, we’ll be fine.’”
And boy, we took the great man’s words to heart. SUV sales have nose-dived, and 72 is no longer your home’s thermostat setting but its current value expressed as a percentage of what you paid for it.
Change:If I understand then Sen. Obama’s logic, in a just world Americans would be 4 percent of the population and consume 4 percent of the world’s resources. And in these past few months we’ve made an excellent start toward that blessed utopia: Americans are driving smaller cars, buying smaller homes, giving smaller Christmas presents.
And yet, strangely, President-elect Barack Obama doesn’t seem terribly happy about the Obamafication of the U.S. economy. He’s proposing some 5.7 bazillion dollar “stimulus” package or whatever it is now to “stimulate” it back into its bad old ways.
Change…
Tim Minchin’s Evening With Artist Storm:
To make a party, the Tynans asked the Pinters to dinner with the Snowdons. Vivien Merchant asked Margaret whether she wasn’t ashamed of being in the Royal Family. Apparently she wasn’t.H.P. sat silent throughout. My only experience of his losing his famous cool was when I asked him about the Arab-Israeli war. He grew excited and said that the Arabs had asked for a bloody good thrashing and had got one.
Frederic Raphael, “Personal Terms”.
Oahu was without power overnight, possibly from a lightning strike, and Hawaiian Electric Co. officials said to expect it to last until morning.
The outages, which began hitting various parts of the island at about 6:30 p.m., also affected the Kailua neighborhood where President-elect Barack Obama is staying.
Barack has a business partner,
Tony Rezko, he’s a crook;
All of Barack’s friends are creepy,
That is, if we care to look.
But we don’t, because we fear that
Following the facts might lead
To the kind of information
That our readers shouldn’t read.
We need to feed them nothing but
Propaganda without end,
Like this shocking scoop on Sarah’s
Daughter’s boyfriend’s mother’s friend.
THE Smithsonian looks at the snowman:
While no one knows for sure when exactly the snowman began smoking a pipe and drinking hard liquor, it may have started as early as 1890, based on a label from a bottle of whiskey from that year. An 1898 postcard shows a snowman carrying two bottles of champagne off to an office party. On holiday greeting cards from the 1900s through and on (up to the 1930s), the snowman often has a drink in one hand and a pipe in the other, mirroring our society’s changes and America’s fascination with smoking and drinking. This would eventually escalate to the snowman cavorting with women and offering drinks to minors. One could argue that these depictions were, in a way, humanizing, but seeing a tipsy snowman chasing a girl with a stick is disturbing at best.
By 1908, there was clear evidence of his partying ways were out of control. In the silent movie The Snowman by Wallace McCutcheon, a chain-smoking snowman is swigging whiskey and appears in the rest of the film sloshed, inspiring a flogging by the townspeople. This behavior would continue on film and media through magazines and postcards as a pickled, skirt-chasing, under-the-table lush. In other words, he had become a frozen W.C. Fields. By the ‘30s and ‘40s, there is no question, the two started to look alike, both wearing straw hats, putting on more weight and looking more round and sporting crimson noses. And both enjoyed prolific silent movie careers based on their reputations as charming drunks. It’s hard to say if either had copied from the other but they were both enhanced by the other’s notoriety. Ironically, W.C. Fields hated the holidays and passed away on Christmas Day, 1946.
Can Al Gore be the new Snowman model?
Source: Snowman Gone Wild
ANORAK reader AGW writes:
I’ll let you all into a secret. One of our regular poster’s significant other has left her and the kids and run away to sea.
He’s one of the crew in this year’s Sydney to Hobart race and the boat is lying third.
This is Big Time stuff. One of the world’s super severe events and particularly so in the Bass Strait (where they are right now) if the Easterly gales start. Those gales are often the norm at this time of year.
One competitor has already sunk and the 14-man crew have been rescued by the nearest fellow competitor Telcoinabox Merit. The rescue racing yacht is heading into the Australian coast to pass the saved crew to a police boat before resuming the race.
I doubt I’d have been brave enough to tempt the fates by calling my boat Perpendicular. In this case, the 54ft yacht became just that after ripping out it’s rudder.
The one to watch is Shockwave.
Top 10 most annoying Americanisms.
A reader writes:
The New York Times, amongst other sources, is reporting today that:
‘Pakistan is moving some troops away from its western border with Afghanistan, where the United States has pressed it to combat Taliban militants, and stopping many soldiers from going on leave amid rising tensions with India, senior Pakistani officials said Friday.’
The bombings in Lahore and Multan, following incursions into Pakistani airspace by Indian jets, appear responsible for the redeployment of some 20,000 Pakistani troops away from the border with Afghanistan to the border with India, along with airpower. India has advised its citizens not to travel to Pakistan, since there are unconfirmed reports of Indian citizens being arrested as suspected terrorists there.
There are other media reports today of a previously unknown pro-Taliban group claiming to be responsible for the Lahore bombing.
The chances of persuading the Pakistani Government and Pakistani people that those reports are unconnected to these events are around zero.
JAMES Lewis shows just how out of youth Americans are:
Vaclav Klaus, president of the Czech Republic, and a dangerous skeptic on the crusading faith of global warming. In his new book, Blue Planet in Green Shackles, President Klaus writes that:
The largest threat to freedom, democracy, the market economy, and prosperity at the end of the 20th and at the beginning of the 21st century is no longer socialism. It is, instead, the ambitious, arrogant, unscrupulous ideology of environmentalism.
Dangerous scepticism against a crusade by a religison based on dogdy statistics and iffy science..?
So here it is wicked Kwanzaa:
As an African American and Pan-African holiday celebrated by millions throughout the world African community, Kwanzaa brings a cultural message which speaks to the best of what it means to be African and human in the fullest sense. Given the profound significance Kwanzaa has for African Americans and indeed, the world African community, it is imperative that an authoritative source and site be made available to give an accurate and expansive account of its origins, concepts, values, symbols and practice.
Moreover, given the continued rapid growth of Kwanzaa and the parallel expanded discussion of it and related issues, an authoritative source which aids in both framing and informing the discussion is likewise of the greatest importance. Therefore, the central interest of this website is to provide information which reveals and reaffirms the integrity, beauty and expansive meaning of the holiday and thus aids in our approaching it with the depth of thought, dignity, and sense of specialness it deserves.
The holiday, then will of necessity, be engaged as an ancient and living cultural tradition which reflects the best of African thought and practice in its reaffirmation of the dignity of the human person in community and culture, the well-being of family and community, the integrity of the environment and our kinship with it, and the rich resource and meaning of a people’s culture. It is within this understanding, then, that the Organization Us, the founding organization of Kwanzaa and the authoritative keeper of the tradition, has established and maintains this website.
A reader wonders: “When do they have their sales?”
HAIL the end of global cooling:
Despite how all the snow is meant to be vanishing by itself during the rapid onset of warmth, this fine company saw a market opportunity for snow removal opening as recently as 2004. Observe the Snowmelter at work.
Hurrah!
Mr Ahmadinejad would also like it to be known that he agrees with the Pope, and anyone who thinks there are any gays in Iran is welcome to check. He invites the UN homosexual weapons inspectors in to Iran without fear.
Ahmadinejad and Pope’s joint Christmas message…
I’m very happy to see that the Salt Nazis (”No salt for you–ever!”) haven’t banned sodium chloride from South Jersey’s roads yet, unlike Seattle.
Nazis get about…
HAROLD Pinter RIP:
Christmas… I am gorged with all the bounty that western civilisation has to offer and rejoicing as I ponder the gifts bestowed by my friends. But I must say my favourite gift today was learning that a loathsome apologist for oh so many of the most vile mass murderers of modern times has finally dropped dead. Good riddance and a pox on anyone who mourns his passing.For me Christmas just got even merrier.
Farewell Harold Pinter
You were the full Pinter
“Death May Be Ageing”
That was one of yours…
Obama will have 10 inaugural balls. He’s redistributing his balls:
The Presidential Inaugural Committee — trumpets, please! — is hosting 10 official balls on the night of Jan. 20. These, ladies and gentlemen, are the only parties where Barack Obama, Joe Biden and their wives are guaranteed to appear, albeit for a quick wave and onstage dance.
Obama ain’t no Bush and his poor money management and so forth:
Despite the clamor to be part of the historic celebration, the Obama team has kept the number of balls to a manageable 10 — the same number Ronald Reagan attended for his second inauguration in 1985. Bill Clinton, Mr. Irrepressible, set the record with 14 balls in 1997; George W. Bush went to eight in 2001 and nine for his second go-round.
It’s a perfect 10 for Obama. Clinton had balls to spare…
IN reply to this opportunistic bollox from Channel 4: Read here:
“Channel Four is aiding and abetting a tyrant. President Ahmadinejad is a torturer and a murderer. His regime executes children, journalists, Sunni Muslims, gay people, political activists and ethnic minorities. This is the equivalent of giving Robert Mugabe a prime-time television slot to promote his propaganda. It is an insult to more than 100,000 Iranian dissidents who have been slaughtered since the Islamic fundamentalists seized power in 1979,”
Now Obama is in power, of course there will be no division in the world and Channel 4 can extend its weather reporting …
Fox News on10 things on global warming in 2008:
1. Cannibalism
2. The death of the Loch Ness Monster
3. More expensive beer
4. Pythons taking over America
5. Kidney stones
6. Skinny whales
7. Shark attacks
8. Black Hawk Down
9. Frozen baby penguins
10. Killer stingray invasion
