Interview

Swedish writer/actor Aron Flam interviews David Horovitz, founder of The Times of Israel.

Happy Easter

- Detail from The Savior of the World by Willem Vrelant

From the Google Art Project

Forever fertile

I think I was hasty when I wrote in my earlier post that RFK Jr. and his chosen running mate were dingbats. By that I didn't mean that they were not intelligent or weren't accomplished.

What I should have written was that while being smart and wealthy, as RFK Jr. and Nicole Shanahan are, can help you do a lot in life, those attributes can't take the place of good judgement. The fact that both RFK Jr. and Shanahan are also anti-vaxxers leads me to believe that neither one of them has the wisdom to be the leader of a country.

Having said that, the whole women's fertility thing that Shanahan seems engrossed in is actually pretty interesting to me too.

Back in 2015 I read an article by Ed Yong, then a writer for National Geographic, about how humans were one of a small number of species in which females do not keep having babies until very old age ... Why Killer Whales Go Through Menopause But Elephants Don’t.

I found the subject intriguing. How would life and society change if women remained fertile their whole lives as men do? Well, we may find out soon. Read more: The Future of Fertility .

Shanahan

The dingbat chooses another dingbat as his running mate - Nicole Shanahan.

RFK Jr.'s vice presidential pick calls IVF ‘one of the biggest lies being told about women’s health

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s running mate has been a harsh critic of in vitro fertilization, while funding alternative research on extending women’s reproductive years ....

“I’m not sure that there has been a really thorough mitochondrial respiration study on the effects of two hours of morning sunlight on reproductive health. I would love to fund something like that,” Shanahan said to a 2023 panel with the National Academy of Medicine, a group to which she had previously donated $100 million ...

The only thing keeping some people out of the loony bin is that they are rich or famous. Imagine the reaction if they were homeless.

But, maybe I'm wrong? The people at The Hill think she is a great cnadidate ... Biden and Trump know Kennedy’s VP choice is a game changer

I think they're tripping.

Holy Week

- St. Mary Magdalene in the House of Simon the Pharisee, 1891, by Jean Béraud, the Musée d'Orsay

On Wednesday of Holy Week, the gospels of Matk, Matthew, and John have accounts of Jesus at the house of Simon the leper in Bethany for dinner. In the accounts, a woman named Mary anoints Jesus' head/feet with expensive oil.

Don't forget them

Israeli Hostage Says She Was Sexually Assaulted and Tortured in Gaza

Amit Soussana is the first former hostage to publicly say she was sexually abused in captivity. A U.N. report has said it found “clear and convincing information” that some hostages suffered “conflict-related sexual violence.” ...

I'm beginning to think that the remaining hostages held by Hamas in Gaza ... more than 100 ... will never be released. Does anyone even remember that they still exist or have they just been written off?

All the international community seems to care about is a permanent ceasefire that will make Israel leave Gaza and keep Hamas in control of the Strip, saving the Palestinians.

No one seems to remember the original victims of this war, but I won't forget them. One of them I especially remember is a young American man named Hersh whose arm was blown off when he was captured by Hamas. His parents still don't know anything about his condition because the Red Cross has still not visited the hostages in Gaza.

Another resolution

Israel nixes US Rafah talks as Washington allows UNSC resolution demanding Gaza ceasefire

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday canceled a planned trip to Washington by his top aides to discuss plans for an offensive in the Gaza city of Rafah, taking the step after the United States refrained from using a veto to block a United Nations Security Council resolution, backed by Russia and China, that called for a ceasefire without conditioning it on the release of hostages ....

The UN Security Council on Monday passed the resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages, but did not make the former conditional on the latter.

The US abstained from the vote, allowing a ceasefire demand to pass for the first time since the start of the war in October ....

The US is now acting baffled by the angry reaction of Israel, saying there has been no change in policy, but htat is just not true. Why would the US allow a resolution for a ceasefire without a mandated hostage release to pass, when we know Hamas will not freely give up those hostages? I mean, some of those hostages are Americans too. And even the UN has said it believes those hostages are being constantly tortured/sexually abused.

I can only think of one reason why the US did this. I believe the Biden administration cares more about winning the upcoming election than it cares about getting the hostages back.

It appears that young voters and Arab/Muslim voters ... almost all Democrats ... are set against Israel, set against the Biden administration helping Israel, and they will not vote for Biden in the upcoming election if this continues.

I am deeply disappointed in the Biden administration for caving in to this element of our party.

Palm Sunday

This is a clip from the movie The Gospel of John ...

a 2003 epic biblical drama film that recounts the life of Jesus according to the Gospel of John.[3] The film is a word-for-word adaptation of the American Bible Society's Good News Bible and follows the Gospel of John precisely, without additions to the story from the other Gospels or omissions of the Gospel's complex passages. It stars Henry Ian Cusick as Jesus of Nazareth, Stuart Bunce as John and is narrated by Christopher Plummer.

I really liked this movie. Henry Ian Cusick (Desmond of LOST) was a good Jesus, and I also like Christopher Plummer's voice. The Gospel of John is my favorite of the gospels because it has a lot of interaction betwee Jesus and women, but it is, unfortunately, also considered the most antisemitic of all the gospels. Because of this, the film starts with a disclaimer ....

Jesus and all his early followers were Jewish. The gospel reflects a period of unprecedented polemic and antagonism between the emerging church and the religious establishment of the Jewish people.

Overall, I think it's worth a watch, especially if you want to know all that's in the Gospel of John.

The Mountain in the Sea

The latest science fiction novel I've checked out of the public library is The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler. As the Amazon page mentions, it is the winner of the 2024 Locus award for best first novel and a finalist for the Nebula award. I'm just at the beginning, but I'm finding it kind of haunting.

Here's a bit from a review in The Guardian ...

The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler – how to speak octopus

If a lion could speak,” Ludwig Wittgenstein wrote, “we could not understand him.” Swap “lion” for “octopus” and you have the philosophical challenge at the heart of this deeply interesting work of science fiction. What if the first alien intelligences we encountered were already living with us on planet Earth?

Rumours of sea monsters off the shores of an archipelago in Vietnam have attracted the attention of a tech giant specialising in AI, Dianima, which has bought and sealed off the islands. A marine biologist, Dr Ha Nguyen, is hired to investigate what might lurk in the water. She is joined at the isolated research station by Evrim, a sexless hyper-intelligent android built by Dianima, and the station’s security chief, a female war veteran named Altantsetseg who conducts a swarm of killer robots as though it were a symphony orchestra. It turns out that the octopuses do have a kind of garden in the sea, but no one is invited ...

I love science fiction, love the library, love my kindle. For years I had a hard time reading books because of my bad vision. I listened to audio books instead but it wasn't the same. Then my sister gave me a kindle and I was able to make text very big and could read again. Yay :)

The resolution

U.S. Gaza ceasefire resolution vetoed by China, Russia at UN Security Council

[...] This was the fourth time since the war began in October that the Security Council failed to agree on a resolution calling for a ceasefire. This time, the dispute was over the U.S. insistence on linking the ceasefire call to a hostage deal and condemnation of Hamas, rather than the unconditional ceasefire resolution demanded by Russia and China ...

The US's resolution at the UN failed to pass. China and Russia, friends of Hamas, vetoed it. Why? They have their plausible reasons, but I think the real reason is the part of the resolution that called for a release by Hamas of all the hostages. Hamas won't do that.

Hamas will try its best to never release the hostages, not just because they can use them as human shields against an invasion of Rafah, but because I believe those hostages they haven't killed yet have been terribly abused. If those hostages are released and Israel and the whole world sees what Hamas has done, there will be no stopping a final military push to crush Hamas forever.

Meanwhile, some research polls ...

From Pew today: Majority in U.S. Say Israel Has Valid Reasons for Fighting; Fewer Say the Same About Hamas

Months into the Israel-Hamas war, roughly six-in-ten Americans (58%) say Israel’s reasons for fighting Hamas are valid. But how Israel is carrying out its response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack receives a more mixed evaluation. About four-in-ten U.S. adults (38%) say Israel’s conduct of the war has been acceptable, and 34% say it has been unacceptable. The remaining 26% are unsure ....

And just 5% of U.S. adults say the way Hamas carried out its Oct. 7 attack on Israel was acceptable, while 66% describe it as completely unacceptable.

Also, few Americans (10%) think Hamas’ actions will make the creation of an independent Palestinian state more likely than it was before the war. Around a third of the U.S. public thinks it will make an independent state less likely (32%) while 15% say it will not have much effect and 41% are unsure ....

Abd from USA Today a few days ago ... Most Palestinians want Hamas in charge when war ends

More than 70% of Palestinians supportHamas’ decision to launch the Oct. 7 offensive into Israel that started the war, and 59% of them want Hamas to control the Gaza Strip when the war is over, according to a new survey by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research. Only 27% of Palestinians would prefer control by any version of the Palestinian Authority, a plan backed by the Biden administration ...

Who do you believe?

Wars are not just fought on the physical battlefield betwen actual combatants. There's also the issue of which side is winning the information war.

In the Israel/Hamas conflict, the terrorists have clearly won that information war, with their presented narrative being accepted not only by most people, but often by news organizations as well: one would think from the headlines that the war is actually taking place between the Israeli army and innocent Gazan civilians. Wait - what about the terrorists?

One example is the recent Israeli raid on Al-Shifa Hospital. The news is full of outrage at that military move, writing that hospitals should never be raided, that health care workers and patients are endangered, that people were detained for questioning, including a journalist.

But not as prominent in the news is that the IDF encountered many members of Hamas and Islamic Jihad at the hospital, that the IDF did detain people for questioning as any military force would, and also that the IDF has been careful to protect and even help hospital staff and patients.

So who do you believe?

You know that confirmation bias thing ... the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values.

Well, apparently, a lot of people prefer to believe the terrorists instead of the Israelis. The same terroists who have raped, tortured, murdered, and kidnapped people. The same terrorists who are continuing to kill Israeli soldiers, who are still shooting rockets at Israelis civilians, and who are still keeping prisoner (and sexually abusing) elderly, female, and child hostages.

I just don't understand why anyone would believe them.

Happiest places

These are the world’s happiest countries in 2024

You will not be surprised to learn that once again, Finland is the world's happiest country. Sadly, I've never been there, or to any of the other Scandinavian countries that are mostly among the topmpst happy places ... maybe someday. But I was surprised to learn that Israel was the 5th happiest country in the world. I've never been there either. Must get out more.

Final tour

Jeff Lynne’s ELO Announce Farewell Tour

[...] Electric Light Orchestra was formed by Lynne, Roy Wood, and Bev Bevan in 1970, with Richard Tandy joining a year later. The group’s initial run came to an end in 1983, with a pair of short-term reunions following in 1984 and 2000. However, in 2014, Lynne resurrected ELO with Tandy in tow, and has since released two studio albums and embarked on several lengthy tours.

ELO has sold over 50 million albums to date and earned seven top 10 hits in North America, including “”Can’t Get It Out of My Head,” “”Don’t Bring Me Down,” and “Xanadu.” In 2017, the band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ...

Who does not love the Electric Light Orchestra?

Here they are for TopPop in 1975 (Evil Woman) ...



And here they are 42 years later and still great, playing at Wembley Stadium, 2017 (Higher and Higher) ...

WSJ

Biden’s Middle East Is a Fantasy World— (A stinging analysis of the real political dynamics in Israeli military actions to neutralize Hamas. The two state solution disappeared on 7 Oct) https://t.co/f56adShxbP

— Barry R McCaffrey (@mccaffreyr3) March 14, 2024

I followed the link and read the article by Amit Segal at the Wall Street Journal ... Biden's Middle East Is a Fantasy World. I was surprised to see that all the stuff I've been thinking about the Israel/Hamas war was shared by the writer.

I don't know what is more disturbing ... that the Biden administration seems to be misrepresenting the situation, or that on the subject of the war, I seem to be turning into a Republican (silent scream!). Well, maybe it's ok - I believe General McCaffrey is a Democrat, like me, and he linked to the article. It is long but well worth a read.

Regime change

Regime change is something the US often ochestrated in the bad old days ...

Since the 19th century, the United States government has participated and interfered, both overtly and covertly, in the replacement of many foreign governments. In the latter half of the 19th century, the U.S. government initiated actions for regime change mainly in Latin America and the southwest Pacific, including the Spanish–American and Philippine–American wars. At the onset of the 20th century, the United States shaped or installed governments in many countries around the world, including neighbors Hawaii, Panama, Honduras, Nicaragua, Mexico, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic ...

We like to think we've grown beyond that now, becaue, you know, it's unethical. But it sure looks like that's what we are trying to do in Israel right now. The latest example ...

Schumer calls for new election in Israel and sharply criticizes Netanyahu

Biden tells a Jewish leader to "come to Jesus" and the Biden administration fetes an Israeli Minister they percieve to be a rival of Netanyahu. Now this.

But the whole Cabinet in Israel is on the same page when it comes to the war, as is most of the population. Most Israelis want Hamas destroyed, and none of the memners of the government wants a 2 state solution. Netanyahu is indeed unpopular here and in Israel, but changing the Prime Minister to Benny Gantz or anyone else will not result in an immediate and permanent ceasefire and end to the war ... no one in Israel wants that.

Our government suggesting regime change in Israel seems to be a disingenuous ploy to pacify Democratic pro-Palestinian voters, by an administration that doesn't want to recognize an inconvenient truth ... Israel's policies are not controlled by the US, but by Israelis.

PP

It is amazing to me, someone who was a volunteer at a local Planned Parenthood when I was in college, that it has taken this long for a government representative to acknowledge that women's gyn visits to Planned Parenthood are persoal "health care" events, not religious/political issues.

The demonization of PP by Republicans and the pro-life movement is insane. PP has been portrayed by them as an abortion conveyor belt, but it really is a place where women, men, and low income people, can get information, cancer screening, exams for infections, contraception (men can get vasectomies), and, yes, abortions. It is all health care, and always has been. US citizens deserve access to it.

My Back Pages

I always liked My Back Pages. Written by Bob Dylan (released 1964), it has odd and interesting lyrics that make for a different sort of song. I don't like his version, though ... liked the Byrds version better.

The most memorable version is the one in which many musicians joined together. In 1992 at the 30th Anniversary Tribute Concert to Dylan at Madison Square Garden, Roger McGuinn (of The Byrds), Tom Petty, Neil Young, Eric Clapton, and George Harrison joined Dylan in a version of the song, with my favorite perfomer being Eric Clapton :) ...

Michael Oren

Today on Meet the Press Now, an interview with former Israeli ambassador to the US, Michael Oren. I've seen him many times on news programs, and here he gives what I think is a much more realistic view of the situation in the Israelu/Hamas war than the Biden administration seems to have chosen ...



I'm not sure why Biden and many Democrats sem to believe Israel will just do our bidding. Yes, we're helping them with weapons and with our veto at the UN, but from their pov, the situation is existential.

:)

Ryan Gosling performs his song from Barbie ... I'm Just Ken ... at the Oscars. Nice suit.

Ryan Gosling Electrifies Oscars With ‘I’m Just Ken’ Live as Margot Robbie, Emma Stone and More Passionately Sing Along; Slash Also Rocks Out on Stage

Come to Jesus?

President Biden has said that Israel sending troops into Rafah would "cross a red line", and he blames Netanyahu for wanting to do so.

But surely Biden realizes that it is not only Netanyahu who believes Israel must enter Rafah to root out the remaining Hamas battalions. Pretty much everyone in Israel, politician and citizen, is on the same page when it comes to Hamas and the war.

Last Friday, Israel's past prime minister, Naftali Bennett, was on Meet the Press Now, and though Kristen Welker tried her best to get him to disagree with Netanyahu on the tactics and goal of the Israel/Hamas war, she couldn't ...



Though Biden may wish it, I don't think he can force Netanyahu or Israel to "come to Jesus" on the subject of the war.

Int. Women's Day

The rest of the western world is trying to treat women more fairly and equally ... France enshrines abortion as a constitutional right as the world marks International Women’s Day ... and ... Ireland’s Constitution says a woman’s place is in the home. Voters are being asked to change that

But in most Middle Eastern countries, women are still treated like poop, and a horrific example of this is the way Hamas fighters (and some Gazan civilians) have treated Israeli women they raped, tortured, murdered, and took hostage ... US, UK and France request UN Security Council convene on October 7 rape report.

And here in the US? Thanks to the Republican party and their Supreme Court Justices (Dobbs), women's health and even lives have been put in danger. But the conservative agenda for women is not just about health care, it's about so much more. As example, I give you the Republican party's real-time version of the Stepford Wife, Alabama Senator Katie Britt (Biden said Republicans oppose women's rights — Katie Britt's "tradwife" response proved him right) ...

State of the Union

I see a future where we defend democracy not diminish it.

I see a future where we restore the right to choose and protect other freedoms not take them away.

I see a future where the middle class finally has a fair shot and the wealthy finally have to pay their fair share in taxes.

I see a future where we save the planet from the climate crisis and our country from gun violence.

Above all, I see a future for all Americans!

I see a country for all Americans!

And I will always be a president for all Americans!

That's a bit from the end of President Biden's State of the Union speech. He did really well! I have to say, though there are things I wish were different, he has turned out to be the best president of my voting lifetime (from Nixon to now). Hope he wins in 2024!

Vote!

My state is one of those which had voting today. I actually voted by drop box yesterday. The main race in my state, aside from president, was for senator to replace Diane Feinstein, and there was also a proposition.

The proposition, Proposition One, is kind of confusing. It's from Gavin Newsom and he said it will "get the homeless off the streets and into treatment".

It purports to be about helping the mental health system and helping the homeless, but in actuality, if I understand it correctly, it conflates homelessness with mental illness and drug abuse, and actually has a fearure that allows for forcing homeless people into mental health facilities against their will.

I think what homeless people need most is, you know, homes, whether that be an aartment or a tiny house or whatever. Homelessness is a problem of being poor, not so much a problem of mental illness and drug abuse, although being poor and unhoused would certainly exaserbate those problems. It costa a lot to live in California ... if my sister and I had not inherited the home where I now live, I would never have had enough money to buy a home.

Here's a bit of an article about Proposition One in The Guardian ...

California wants to force people into mental health care. Advocates say it will backfire

[...] California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, who proposed the measure as a crucial part of his plans to solve the state’s dire homelessness crisis, has said it would “prioritise getting people off the streets, out of tents and into treatment”. Opponents, including disability rights activists, mental health advocates and the American Civil Liberties Union, countered that it would take money away from community-based preventative mental health programs to finance locked-door psychiatric institutions and involuntary treatment.

“It’s good politics, as Newsom positions himself to run for president in 2028,” said Samuel Jain, a senior policy attorney for Disability Rights California, an advocacy group. “It’s not good policy.” ...

Needless to say, I voted against it, but it may well pass.

UN report

From The Washington Post ...

U.N. report: ‘Convincing’ information Hamas raped, tortured hostages

A team of United Nations experts tasked with gathering information on sexual violence linked to Hamas’s Oct. 7 attacks on Israel found “reasonable grounds to believe” that some victims were sexually assaulted, including rape and gang rape, according to a U.N. report released Monday.

“In most of these incidents, victims first subjected to rape were then killed,” a press release announcing the report’s findings said. “The mission team also found a pattern of victims, mostly women, found fully or partially naked, bound, and shot across multiple locations.”

The 23-page report said the team also found “clear and convincing information” that some of the women and children taken back to Gaza that day by Hamas as hostages were subjected to “rape and sexualized torture and sexualized cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.” There were “reasonable grounds to believe,” it said, “that this violence may be ongoing.” ...

Gee, it only took the UN five months :(

And even with this, the UN still went on to demand a permanent ceasefire. You know, so the Hamas rapists and torturers and murderers can continue to rule in Gaza.

Mouse

It has now been just over 2 weeks since my cat Mouse disappeared. I guess I'm finally starting to realize that he might not be coming back.

He first appeared in the yard in the fall of 2015 with his mother Misty. They were really afraid of me and it took a long time for Misty to trust me, but Mouse became friendly pretty quickly. He was small and gray and so thus his name.

I really miss him. I still hope he will reappear. I''ve been looking at the County's missing cats page, but no luck so far. He is not a spring chicken and he has a permanent limp, and I'm afraid something bad may have happened to him.

Looting

ABC News segment tonight about the US air dropping aid in Gaza. Also shown is another aid truck in northern Gaza being looted by hundreds of Gazans, as reported a few days ago by the IDF ...

The extreme hunger on display today with hundreds once again surrounding an aid truck in northern Gaza ... the shortage of food means gangs are looting and reselling what valuable aid there is ...

Air deops

As Admial Kirby spoke of at the White House press briefing today (aboit 7 minutes in), the US is planning to do some air food drops into Gaza, due to the danger to aid ground convoys from mobs and looting.

This reminds me of the situation in the 90s in Somalia, in which the US did food drops due to food being stolen by warlords and criminals on the ground. Here's a bit from Wikipedia: 1992 famine in Somalia.

[...] In 1991, Somalia's formal economy collapsed after several years of decline. That same year and during 1992, southern Somalia was struck by an exceptionally harsh drought. Concurrently, traditional coping methods broke down as the civil war spread into the south and law enforcement disintegrated. The largest contributing factor behind the famine was the devastation inflicted on infrastructure and farmland by warfare in the agricultural inter-riverine regions.

[...]

In early 1992, as relief agencies initiated their operations, they encountered growing obstacles in delivering aid to the impacted inter-riverine region. The disintegration of Somali law enforcement paved the way for armed looters and criminals to steal food from storage sites and supply routes. In certain affected areas, armed banditry on these routes emerged as a significant concern. To safeguard their supplies, NGOs and relief agencies contracted Somali mercenaries or local gangs, equipped with improvised combat vehicles, to escort their convoys.

[...]

US aid airlifts to the Red Cross that began in August 1992 and gone on until December has been credited with saving around 40,000 lives ...

About the event in Gaza in which the aid trucks were stormed by a nob ... what actually happened is in dispute. It's depressing, though, that most people and news organizations prefer to believe the terrorists over the Israelis.