Letters to the Editor
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Thank you!
After reading today's cover story, I thought I should write to you. You deserve hundreds of letters in praise of your thoughtful blog.
Thank you. I felt rather bashed and bullied by Ms. Paglia's nonsense. You didn't give me good news about the world, nor did you offer titillating opinions bound to offend, but you certainly cleared my mind with intelligence and sound writing.
Bravo, Sir.
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Where in the sixties were you?
People went on pilgrimages to airports to spit on returning soldiers and call them baby killers. -- ondelette
This I absolutely don't remember, despite having been in what most folks would consider medias res.
Would you be willing to cite chapter and verse, just so we can lay the issue to rest?
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@ David
so perfect
Thank you Arne and Svensker for so dutifully proving my point.
I was commenting on your Wednesday, March 14, 2007 6:32:43 AM vacuity. Sorry I didn't put in a timestamp, but I hadn't even seen your latest spew. Of course, if the shoe fits....
It's really interesting. The vocal Right is perfectly content to indulge anti-Muslim rhetoric. And the vocal Left is perfectly content to indulge anti-Semitic rhetoric....
You're missing the boat (and have been for some time). There's a considerable difference between being opposed to the Likidnik/AIPAC folks, and being "anti-Semitic". And FWIW, there's a difference between being "anti-Semitic" and "anti-Zionist" as well (although the latter may be a poorer and/or over-general representation of the hardline pro-Israeli-hawk than "Likudnik"). That you mistake one for the other shows that you haven't the sense that Gawd gave a gnat. Repeat after me: Opposition to Israeli policies (much less hard-line RW Likudnik influence) is not "anti-Semitism"....
And FWIW, your nonsense about Glenn not going after "unmask911" was refuted by Glenn before you ever piped up about it.
... And the imbeciles on this site have no idea that the imbeciles posting at LGF are their mirror image. I love it.
Absolute nonsense. When you see epithets of "yarmulkehead" being tossed around here, come back and talk abot it (and FWIW, if someone used that term here, I wouldn't be the least surprised if Glenn gave them the boot immediately).
Cheers,
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I knew people who did it, and there were reports of it elsewhere
Forgive me, not a latin scholar, what is medias res?
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ondelette
In the middle of things. I'm not asking who, only where and when.
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The Spitting Myth, Again
William Timberman:
Where in the sixties were you?
People went on pilgrimages to airports to spit on returning soldiers and call them baby killers. -- ondelette
This I absolutely don't remember, despite having been in what most folks would consider medias res.
Would you be willing to cite chapter and verse, just so we can lay the issue to rest?
It was a long post. Somewhere along the line, the meds wore off.
Even before that, I stopped reading. You're a better man than I.
The truth: The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory, and the Legacy of Vietnam by Jerry Lembcke
http://www.amazon.com/Spitting-Image-Memory-Legacy-Vietnam/dp/0814751474
Library Journal:
Images of long-haired antiwar protesters, almost always women, spitting on returning Vietnam veterans have become a shameful part of America's collective memory. Lembcke (sociology, Holy Cross Univ.), a member of Vietnam Veterans Against the War, here presents a stunning indictment of this myth--an illusion created, he maintains, by the Nixon-Agnew administration and an unwitting press to attribute America's loss in Vietnam to internal dissension. In fact, the antiwar movement and many veterans were closely aligned, and the only documented incidents show members of the VFW and American Legion spitting on their less successful Vietnam peers. But Lembcke's most controversial conclusion is that posttraumatic stress disorder was as much a political creation--a means of discrediting returning vets who protested the war as unhinged--as it was a medical condition. The image of the psycho-vet was furthered through such Hollywood productions as The Deer Hunter and Coming Home. This forceful investigation challenges the reader to reexamine assumptions about the dark side of American culture that glorifies war more than peace. Highly recommended for large public libraries and for all academic peace studies collections.
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Re: Glenn's update
"Men rarely (if ever) managed to dream up a god superior to themselves. Most gods have the manners and morals of a spoiled child" - Robert Heinlein, from Time Enough for Love [I love that title, never read the book, though]
Premise: All may be possible
Axiom: Some might not be possible
Moral: All is not permissable.
Ethics: What's both?
That's pretty juvenile, but I would guess George W. Bush would have a fairly difficult time making his way through the riddle. It's much easier to go with your "gut instinct" and say the Supreme Rule of the Universe, the Alpha and Omega, the Lord thy God, is giving you a big thumbs up than actually having to learn how to use one's brain (properly.)
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@ David
At the risk of flogging the rotting carcass of a deceased equine:
Coulter's success merits attacking her, but it doesn't negate the fact that anti-Semitic thought, and virulently anti-Israel sentiment perilously close to classic anti-Semitism, is today found among the Left and it seems to bother no one.
1). No. Coulter's hatred and vile slanders merit attacking her.
2). Where's the "virulent[] anti-Semitism" here? I will acknowledge that there are some on the "left" that have made anti-Semitic remarks, but they're not hanging around here, nor would they be welcome.
3). Anti-Israeli (and anti-Israeli policy) sentiment is not per se anti-Semitism. There's plenty of Jews that are against (current) Israeli policy ("self-hating Jews", I suppose you'd say, eh?). Equating "anti-Israel" with "anti-Semitism" is simply not accurate (nor helpful), in precisely the same way as equating Israel with Judaism would be wrong.
4). If someone did engage in overt anti-Semitism here, I'd be over them as well. But I am of the firm belief that current Israeli policy is wrongheaded and unproductive. You commented a while back about the Wall. I don't have a lot of problems with a wall. But it shouldn't run through the midst of Arab land, and if Israel is going to shut itself off at the borders, they should also give reparations at the very least for any people whose land was expropriated within Israel, and they ought to get the hell out of Palestine. Good fences are not sufficient to make good neighbours.
Cheers,