I’m at a loss over who I’d like to see win in the recent fighting between Hizbullah and supporters of the Lebanese government.
On the one hand, although Hizbullah say they no longer want to make Lebanon into an Islamic state, there are no doubt still some very dodgy people in the Hizbullah leadership, with very dodgy religious agendas. And the more religion gets out of politics and retreats into the private sphere, the better it will be for the entire human species.
On the other hand, the fighting statrted because the Lebanese government wanted Hizbullah to scrap their secure telecom network, which provided telephone and Ineternet communications independently of the Lebanese government. I think everyone should have access to secure telecoms networks that are independent of governments.
Melanie Phillips has written a piece on the Annapolis conference. In it she talks about how threatened she thinks Israel is and how important it is that Israel is defended. I may discuss Annapolis later, but consider: Phillips, a British Jew, was 22 years old during the 1973 Arab-Israeli war. She did not at the time or later, go to Israel and join its armed forces. Surely the rational and honest thing to do would be to fight for what she believes in?
But I doubt if rationality and honesty are her strong suits. How can they be when she flirts with creationism (which she thinks should be taught in schools), when she believes in the media’s MMR hoax, when she — without the scientific background to understand the evidence — thinks global warming is a “fraud” and a “con-trick“? Indeed the only talent Phillips has shown in her entire worthless life is talking bullshit.
So, according to the story, one of these days there will be a Wile E. Coyote moment for the dollar: the moment when the cartoon character, who has run off a cliff, looks down and realizes that he’s standing on thin air – and plunges. In this case, investors suddenly realize that Stein’s Law applies — “If something cannot go on forever, it will stop” – and they realize they need to get out of dollars, causing the currency to plunge. Maybe the dollar’s Wile E. Coyote moment has arrived – although, again, I’ve been wrong about this so far.
Krugman adds that the Saudis are rumoured to be about to diversify into euros. Certainly, if they had been buying euros instead of dollar for the last 5 years, they’d be a lot better off now, as this graph shows:
(You can get a dynamic version of this graph from Yahoo)
So it seems likely that governments, worried about the fall in value of their dollar holdings, will not buy dollars in future and will diversify their existing holdings into other currencies, particularly the euro. This reduction in the demand for dollars will in turn cause further drops in the value of the dollar, prompting those countries that haven’t already shifted their holdings out of it to do so. It seems likely that we are seeing the end of the dollar as the world’s reserve currency.
An appeal court in Saudi Arabia has doubled the number of lashes and added a jail sentence as punishment for a woman who was gang-raped.
The victim was initially punished for violating laws on segregation of the sexes - she was in an unrelated man’s car at the time of the attack. When she appealed, the judges said she had been attempting to use the media to influence them.
Of course this is largely the result of Wahhabism, the so-conservative-it-makes-the-dark-ages-look-enlightened form of Islam that is the state religion of Saudi Arabia.
King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia is on a state visit to Britain at the moment, and as his limo arrived to meet the Queen, the band of the Coldstream Guards played the Imperial March theme from Star Wars, a tune associated specifically with arch-villain Darth Vader. Someone’s idea of a joke?
The Policy Exchange has uncovered the presence, in mosques, islamic schools, and other cultural organisations, of political material which flies in the face of the values which Inayat and I cherish.
Hate material was found at only 25% of British Mosques surveyed. However, those mosques were typically those generously funded by Saudi Arabia, and included many institutions regarded as both moderate and mainstream.
One of the examples he gives is this:
I believe that Jehad is obligatory against hostile, non-compromising, nonMuslim states if Muslims have enough power to carry it out, so that their force is broken and they do not obstruct the preaching of Islam. Aggressive Jehad is not advisable against those non hostile and compromising non Muslim states who allow preaching of Islam in their territories particularly these days when territorial subjugation is generally condemned in the world, contrary to the times when capture of land was common. The Aggressive Jehads of the major part of Islamic history all belong to the same period. However, Muslims must attain their martial superiority and keep expanding it so that non Muslim states remain subdued ‘for fear of Jehad’, to say nothing of actual Jehad.
– Islam and Modernism, Justice Muhammad Taqi Usmani who is a prominent Deobandi cleric
Now let’s modify this paragraph somewhat:
I believe that war is morally correct against hostile, non-compromising, non-Western states that are part of the Axis of Evil if the USA and its allies have enough power to carry it out, so that their force is broken and they do not obstruct the spread of freedom and democracy. Aggressive war is not advisable against those non-hostile and compromising non-Western states particularly these days when territorial subjugation is generally condemned in the world, contrary to the times when capture of land was common. However, the USA must keep its military superiority so that non-Western states remain subdued for fear of being attacked, to say nothing of actually being attacked.
This paragraph is probably very close to the beliefs of George Bush and Tony Blair. If one is hate speech and should be banned, then on what grounds is the other not hate speech? Or does David T think statements like the 2nd should be banned too?
Vince Cable, the acting leader of the Liberal Democrats, is refusing to meet King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, who is currently in Britain on a state visit:
Mr Cable says he will not attend any of the planned ceremonial events - as would be normal for the leader of one of the main opposition parties.
Mr Cable told the BBC’s Today programme that by any assessment of Saudi Arabia, “the human rights record is appalling”. He also cited the regime’s arms deal with the British firm BAE and the row over alleged corruption surrounding it.
Mr Cable added: “I think it’s quite wrong that as a country we should give the leader of Saudi Arabia this honour.” He said that although Britain has a “business-like” relationship with the country, Britain would not dream of extending the same invitation to other controversial leaders like Libya’s Colonel Gadaffi. He said he had also been critical of the Saudi regime’s treatment of Britons.
Cable is probably wrong about Gadaffi — if Gadaffi was buying 20 billion quid of British weapons, he’d likely get a state visit too. (And why not? Being nice to foreigners with dodgy human rights records is OK if Britain can make a profit out of doing so.)
Jonathan Calder of Liberal England and Rumbold of Pickled Politics both approve of Cable’s behaviour. I don’t. I think if Cable has problems with Saudi Arabia (and particularly its human rights record) he should attend the events, and tell the Saudis politely but firmly what he thinks. While talking to people you disagree with might not solve all the world’s problems, it’s likely to be more effective than I’m-not-talking-to-you gesture politics.
In particular, Cable should tell the Saudis that relations between the UK and the KSA would be improved if the Saudis didn’t torture or otherwise infringe the rights of UK nationals detained in their country. And that if Saudi Arabia improved rights for women, particularly the right to drive, they would not only get a much better image in the West, they would also be doing their country’s economy a favour — it’s ridiculous to ignore or suppress the talents of a large portion of their country’s people. Saudi Arabia’s oil isn’t going to last forever, and they should be preparing now for when it ends.
In the longer term, one’s thoughts should turn to the question of how does one improve human rights throughout the world, and in particular prevent foreign dictators from torturing Britons. It seems to me that part of the answer lies in creating a stronger, bigger, better armed, more unified European Union, which because of its size and power would have a large array of sticks and carrots with with to persuade foreign countries to do what we want. Then, if foreigners tortured civilized people EU citizens, we could credibly threaten to bomb or invade their country, to boycott their goods, to arm their enemies, etc.
Gordon Brown wants to emulate his predecessor Tony Blair, and be Bush’s poodle, if this report in the Telegraph is accurate:
Gordon Brown has agreed to support US air strikes against Iran if the Islamic republic orchestrates large-scale attacks by militants against British or American forces in Iraq, according to senior Pentagon officials. Washington sources say the Prime Minister has been informed of US plans to launch limited air and special forces raids against Revolutionary Guard bases.
After talks with President George W Bush in July, Mr Brown left US officials with the belief that Britain was “on board” for a military response — but only if Iran was proved to be behind a big militant attack or another stunt similar to the kidnapping in March of British sailors.
And what’s Brown going to accept as “proof”? The say-so of Dumbya?
Eve Garrard, writing in normblog, objects to two statements regarding Jews and Israel.
The first is attributed to Richard Dawkins: “[the Jewish lobby] more or less monopolise American foreign policy as far as many people can see.” (from an article in the Guardian. Incidently it’s unclear whether Dawkins actually said those words; in any case he is reported to have said them).
The second is from an unnamed person on a mailing list, which Garrard quotes as:
Issues of Palestine are now determining tenure issues in the States. Can we expect the Zionist lobby to go the same way here[?]… Bread and butter issues cannot be neatly compartmentalised so that we have separate arrangements for what is “safe” (and does not threaten Zionism) and “not safe” (in what actively opposes Zionism).
Garrard sees two problems with both statements. Firstly that they are evidence of anti-Jewish prejudice1, and secondly that few people protest against these statements (and statements like them).
When I read these statements I start by asking myself: are they true? And it seems to me that both contain a fair degree of truth. The USA does have a very pro-Israel foreign policy; for example Israel is the USA’s largest recipient of foreign aid, even though it is a comparatively wealthy country. Many people do believe that the Israel lobby has a large influence over USA foreign policy in the Middle East. The Israel/Palestine conflict does affect whether someone gets tenure in American universities, as is demonstrated by the recent examples of Nadia Abu El-Haj and Norman Finkelstein.
Perhaps the reason for a lack of protest against these words is that they are largely truthful, and stating the truth ought to be — even if it is not — in Garrard’s words “normalized, unexceptionable, unworthy of remark”. Some people are opposed to the actions of the Israeli state and the Israel lobby, and these are perfectly normal and ethically respectable political positions to take. The majority of these people are not motivated by bigotry against Jews, though obviously some are, and it is wrong to suggest that someone is motivated by bigotry unless one has evidence that that person is.
Note:
1. Garrard uses the phrase “anti-Semitism” which properly analysed ought to refer to people who hate Semites; but the majority of people who speak Semitic languages aren’t Jews, and there are many Jews who don’t speak any Semitic languages. I find this term an imprecise and inaccurate way of refering to anti-Jewish bigotry, so I don’t use it. If you want to understand issues, you need to think clearly, and you should therefore aim to speak clearly and precisely too.
