Heretics' almanac

Chavez the dork

In this past week's Slate gabfest, Emily Bazelon, who I find utterly charming, at least on podcast, has no patience for the "pandering" of Nancy Pelosi and others who went against Hugo Chavez for his rant about Bush being the devil, the smell of sulphur, etc. She seemed to think that it made no sense for Pelosi or anyone else to condemn Chavez for voicing his criticism against Bush.

Of course, it's entirely possible that Pelosi and the others were shamelessly pandering, but I think you can be pretty harsh on Chavez, critical about Bush, and still maintain intellectual integrity.

The first thing I thought when I saw Chavez's rants was: "With enemies like that, Bush hardly needs friends." I thought it was irrelevant that he was in New York, though I did think it was relevant that he was at the United Nations. I already knew that he is in violent disagreement with Bush (to put it kindly), and he had absolutely every right to express that. But it was ridiculous and childish to cross himself and make a religious thing out of it.

The shameful self-righteousness of the Norwegian media

Document.no reports that the Norwegian press took note of the criticism against their coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict, reflected over it for about 2 nanoseconds, and then dismissed it. If the Israelis feel bad about the way the press treats them, they only have themselves to blame.

At this point, I think that most people and certainly Norwegian Jews, would rather put this whole thing behind them and leave the status quo alone.

Obviously, the Norwegian editorial elite really doesn't care. They are so steeped in their own superiority complex, prejudice and left-wing dogma that any appeal to reason, compassion, or decency gets shrugged off like annoying flies. It doesn't matter that you prove error after error, fallacy after fallacy, after their writing. They're editors, so it must necessarily follow that they're pretty close to infallible.

Aftenposten unmasked

Miryam Shomrat, the ambassador to Norway, was upset about the shooting at the synagogue in Oslo and recently violated diplomatic protocol by wondering out loud why the Norwegian royal family didn't do more to visibly support its Jewish subjects. After all, she pointed out, the congregation in Oslo makes a point of every week offering its prayers on behalf of the King, Queen and their household during Shabbat services.

Oh boy. Not wasting any time, the president of the Oslo synagogue got on the phone with the newspapers, characterizing Shomrat's points as "very, very unwise," pointing out that she is "not our ambassador." The Norwegian foreign minister Jonas Gahr Støre gave strong voice to his view that Shomrat was "inappropriate."

Shomrat herself expressed her regrets over the whole thing, making it clear she never meant to criticize the royal family.

Terrorist charges filed in Norway

The Norwegian police moved quickly to arrest four suspects for the shooting at the synagogue in Oslo, and now these four are facing indictments and imprisonment pending trial. It appears that the police has had the four under surveillance for some time and have recordings of lots of potentially incriminating conversations.

The four are now being charged not just for the actual attack on the synagogue, but also for conspiring to launch terrorist attacks against the synagogue as well as the Israeli and American synagogues. In a move that surprised many, initial court proceedings have been open, and the decisions made by Saturday morning.

The defense attorneys concede the content of the conversations, but also claim there is no evidence that any of the four actually perpetrated the shootings, nor that the conversations constituted actual plans.

Opening madness in Turtle Bay

The opening of the United Nations General Assembly sessions are always a circus, providing a bully pulpit (and entry visas) for all the world's despots.

Against the backdrop of Bush's no-news but still largely relevant speech, Ahmadinejad gave a speech addressed to the Arab world, fellow "non-aligned" despots, and the left wing. Hugo Chavez dispensed with formalities and simply called Bush "the devil."

Bolton really couldn't ask for a better case for why the US should mostly ignore the will of the United Nations, especially that General Assembly part of it.

But if Chavez came off like someone on a vendetta for getting his butt kicked too often in the playground, it's clear that the civilized world should not underestimate Ahmadinejad.

Update: shooting in Oslo

According to Aftenposten, four men between the ages of 20 and 30, have been arrested and charged with the shooting against the synagogue in Oslo. Apparently, the investigation is still underway, so there aren't a lot of details. The police have said that the men are of "mixed" ethnic backgrounds, and that there are ethnic Norwegians among them.

I'm sure there will be more details and lots and lots of hype.

Anne Applebaum is right

She pretty much says it all, here.

I don't much buy the "Blame America First" rhetoric coming from the Ann Coulters of the world, but I do have to wonder why the Western press is so loath to hold everyone to the same standard. I haven't parsed the pope's speech all that carefully, but I can see how it was offensive. But honestly, the point he was trying to make was valid, even if his references were poorly chosen.

More on the shootings in Oslo

Norwegian authorities, the politicians, and the press are not yet sure how to interpret the shooting at the synagogue in Oslo. There is of course outrage and concern. The police are investigating, the minister of justice is discussing better security with the synagogue, officials from the Church of Norway are showing solidarity, SOS Rasisme has expressed its disgust.

You don't see any op-eds raising the issue whether this is indicative of an undercurrent of antisemitism in Norway.

To some extent, this is reasonable. We don't know who did the shooting or why. It could have been a bunch of hoodlums who had nothing better to do; or it could be an attempt at scaring the Jewish community into submission. Or something and someone else.

Jews in Norway face an uncertain future

Last night, a few hours after S'lichot services presumably ended, someone shot 4-5 bullets at the synagogue in Oslo. The police are investigating. The shul is right next to the community house and a senior citizen home also owned by the Jewish community, but the bullets were aimed at the presumably empty synagogue building.

This was a warning. And after politicians, academics, and others put in the appropriate show of shock and outrage, they'll go right back to fueling the flames of antisemitism in Norway by condemning and demonizing Israel. Norway, with all of about 1400 Jews, is about to become the poster boy example of New Antisemitism.

With only 1400 Jews, it won't take long before most of them are gone. Without much (though I do have some) data to support this sad hypothesis, I'm going to guess that within 10 years, there will be less than 1000; within 20 it will be negligible. The Norwegian Center for Studies of Holocaust and Religious Minorities recently opened in Oslo and will probably become a memorial by then - if it is allowed to exist. My guess is that it'll be co-opted into a center for demonizing Israel by characterizing Israel's existence as an exercise in ethnic cleansing.

9/11/2006

It's been five years. At the time of day I start this, I was on the train into Manhattan, getting ready to walk from Penn Station to Sixth Avenue between 18th and 19th Streets. The weather was similar to what it is today, but it was five years ago. In a few hours, it will be exactly five years since the world changed. The weather didn't change much in the course of the day, but by the time I made my way home, I know things would be different. And I wondered how I would feel about the day 5, 10, 15, 20 years in the future; and what the world would look like.

It's been five years. Those whose lives were in danger are undoubtedly still traumatized; those whose loved ones were murdered on that day are still grieving, though they have somehow moved on; those fireman, cops, and rescue workers who went into the face of danger are still struggling. But for most of us, the immediacy of the attack itself is a bad memory, evoked by different cues.

How do I feel?