Your barely concealed arrogance and hauteur makes no friends or allies.

While BarbaraB makes a valid point about the limitations of any given blog, it seems to me that what is happening now in Lebanon demands attention, and action, from American political activists, especially when the Bush administration rushes armaments and jet fuel to Israel so it can keep killing and, alone of all the world’s nations (except Israel and Great Britain, of course) refuses to call for an immediate ceasefire, and Congress makes a big show of passing resolutions essentially giving Israel a blank check to commit atrocities in the name of “self-defense.”

It’s ironic, too, on at least two counts: first, Christy’s post seems to welcome new voices to the conversation, yet when a first-time commenter joins in, she is immediately put down by others in ths “welcoming” community–in at least one case, apparently, (comment 37) with such hostility that Christy saw fit to intervene. Second, Jane Hamsher, quite rightly, takes the media to task for obsessing on what Ned had for dinner while ignoring “Iraq in flames”–even as FDL largely ignores Lebanon in flames.

If people acted, it could be stopped. But please don’t let Lebanon impose on your “gemutlichkeit.”

We’ve been hearing that the Bush Administration’s rejection of a cease fire in Lebanon is based on a desire for an “enduring peace.” Nixon in his second inaugural address stated: “Let us be proud that by our bold, new initiatives, and by our steadfastness for peace and honor, we have made a breakthrough toward creating in the world what the world has not known before–a structure of peace that can last…” This address was delivered a few weeks after a massive bombing of North Vietnam’s capitol. Solomon sets out other examples of former presidents who make war while talking of peace. Bush is just more of the same.

ck @88, well said. Thanks for the reminder.

http://billmon.org/archives/002581.html

http://harpers.org/StabbedInTheBack.html

I go to Whiskey Bar to read Billmon. Looks like his guest post here was a while back. Before I posted I did a search of the term “Lebanon” and, with the exception of TRex’s July 25th post, which explicitly references overwhelming force by Israel against civilians (in a post with a humorous tone), came up with bland hand-wringing references to “the conflict between Israel and Lebanon” and similar, which completely mask the asymmetric and barbaric nature of that “conflict”.

On a day when Israeli war planes scored a direct hit on the village of Qana, killing upwards of sixty civilians, many of them children, and none of Christy’s links relate to that “conflict” (”massacre” would be a more appropriate term), I find that a conspicuous omission. please go view the photos at Angry Arab if you haven’t already done so; I am certain the name “Qana” evokes memories of April 1996 in most of you, since you are obviously so clued up.

While I have been visiting this site, along with many others, for some months now, I freely admit I don’t usually read the 200-odd comments on the posts here, no. Nor will I feel so inclined in future, since I don’t feel terribly welcome here. I do “do my homework.” In addition to Billmon, I read Juan Cole, Digby, Dennis Perrin, Riverbend (when she posts, which is rarely these days), Dennis Perrin, Down with Tyranny, Democracy Now!, Dahr Jamail, reports at information clearinghouse, and a host of others, including articles by Robert Fisk, whom I also met in person and interviewed prior to the invasion of Iraq.

Goodbye.

I haven’t been here much lately – what is Egregious doing? Apparently s/he is in the former USSR somewhere, doing something charitable, but I missed what. I’ll try search. apparently birthday wishes are in order for egregious, too, so I second them. (my ‘puter reads cyrillic, but I’ve never figured out how to set up to type it, not having many folks who could read it).