What I meant, if you have a reading comprehension above high school level, is that everyone brings personal biases, subjectivities, cultural frameworks and notions of identity into their arguments. This is the entire point of much of 20th Century philosophical inquiry -- to root out and identify the limits of language, the limitations of systems of meaning, the slippage of signifier and the shifting codes of meaning in perpetual dialectic transformation.

Then lawyers like Glenn come along, proclaim they've reached a perfect truth, and those who disagree must have "biases" that limit their ability to think like Glenn does.

The entire core of this silliness is that Glenn believes he's achieved a perfect critical consciousness, unbiased and equally applicable to "all countries," not just Israel. Glenn does this using a superficial lawyerly list of "attributes" that must take place for his condemnation, or his support. He then produces an entirely secondary framework to critique his enemies -- one grounded not in facts, actions and events, but motivations, biases and personal emotions.

It is the double-standard of a debater without education. A wordsmith without thought.

Glenn's a brilliant lawyer. As a psychologist, he's a disgrace.

Glenn claims he has a consistent yardstick, unblemished by Glenn's own personal biases, that he applies to all countries, Israel included. Glenn's premise is that many (but not Glenn) are blinded by personal loyalties, backgrounds, emotional status, etc. that leads them (but not Glenn) to reach conclusions that are illogical.

But not Glenn.

It would take 5 minutes to drum up a basic armchair "analysis" that Glenn's frustration at being a dual "other" within larger normative society, both queer and Jewish, leads Glenn to want to purge one of his Otherness attributes to normalize the second. Glenn's attempt to purge his own Jewishness by offering society proof that he is not like the "other Jews" (those swayed by personal bias) is Glenn's desperate attempt to normalize and inscribe his queerness into the larger normativity. If Glenn can only prove he is not one of "those Jews," then his queerness will finally be accepted.

Is this a crap analysis? Of course. I don't care about Glenn's background. I care that his expert logical approach to facts on the Constitution, our media and the failures of our institutions turn into a blazing mess when the issue turns to Israel, an issue where's Glenn's biases are as inscribed and obvious as anyone else on the issue.

I'm not claiming to be "above" personal bias. If anything, I believe my Jewishness gives me sensitivity to the misuse of historical narratives that had led to so much violence and persecution in the past, just as an African-American can see the warning signs coming down the track when the issue turns to race relations.

Glenn, however, claims he is above his own biases here. Once again, an expert lawyer, but a lousy, and fairly obviously false, argument. Glenn's arguments are dripping with personal assumptions, inferences, snap judgment psychoanalysis and assumptions of motivation. The very "biases" he claims "get in the way" of the arguments of those who disagree with him. It's nonsensical logic.

Doesn't the fact that this struggle has continued pretty much unabated for those same 20 years convince you that using the heavy handed approach to the problem actually has proven not to work mean anything to you?

But it hasn't continued consistently. It is disgraceful how quickly we forget the Second Intifada. It began in 2000 when Israel was coming off its longest period of peace and concessions to the Palestinians since Egypt and Syria declared war on Israel in 1973 (The "Yom Kippur War", it's worth Googling).

Israel has been under near constant assault since its formation.

Yet in spite of all this, Israel went to the peace table and offered Arafat, as fraudulent a "leader" as there has ever been, a huge peace offering. Arafat unleashed suicide bombers by the hundreds.

You call Israel "heavy handed," and they undoubtedly have been over the past six years. But can you just dismiss the Second Intifada, what that did to Israeli civilization? Tourism? The ability for the nation to function?

Glenn claims military action by Israel never works.

Did the 1990s peace process work? Did Israel's offer to return land work? Did American funding of the PLA work?

Or did suicide bombers unleash hell on the streets of Israel?

You don't want Israel to be "heavy handed," and neither do I, but the truth is that it does work, at least in the sense of reducing attacks on Israelis. Glenn is completely wrong on this point. We can debate the morality of killing hundreds of Palestinians for this, whether the response is appropriate or not (and we should debate this), but we can't debate that Israel's military response in 2003-2004 ended the Second Intifada. There are maybe 1-2 suicide bombers a year now in Israel. The checkpoints and border sealings that you bemoan are the reason for that drop in suicide bombings.

What should Israel do?

Yes, the checkpoints are cutting off the Palestinians and causing great suffering. But after the Second Intifada, what choice did Israel have?

Have Israeli deaths fallen due to Israeli tactics or have they risen?

Since the Second Intifada, they've fallen significantly.

Should Israel ban the automobile? After all, in 2007, there were 43 Israelis killed by automobiles for every single Israeli killed by a terrorist.

Death by accident is not the same thing as murder. You're better than this question.