Ridiculous !

No, this isn’t a spell taken out of the Harry Potter universe. It’s the toned down expression of what I felt when I read that scientists managed to extract stem cells from an embryo while preserving said embryo.

Embryos used to get stem cells are surplus embryos that will be destroyed anyway, and will never see a womb and much less one day be born and become a human being. Thus this breakthrough has no true interest whatsoever, except for the bigots and fanatics who live in the US and refuse to allow stem cell research—the current US president first and foremost among them.

But beyond that, beyond the pure scientific value of achieving that, do people even realize what this means? What this shows concerning the values held high by the self-righteous fools who lead America and populate the Bible Belt?

Well, it means that they care more about two or four cells without a hint of human life to them, than about the homeless, the illegal immigrants, the jobless and all the people suffering in the world. You can’t have stem cell research because it destroys a surplus, hence useless embryo, but you can glorify a social and economic system that treats people like garbage, or at best like variables in a financial equation (and not the most significant variables, at that).

You can’t destroy surplus embryos, so you have to spend millions of US dollars in research to still get stem cells while preserving the embryos, but you won’t give up a cent for taxes in order to have the country offer a real social blanket to the dozens of millions of people living in utter poverty in the US.

For embryos, Georges W Bush would use his veto.

For all the people struggling to live their life, for all the people who have no rights, not even that to take a leave of absence for sickness without getting fired on the spot, Georges W Bush has nothing to offer. No veto, no law, no project, other than a farce whose sole utility is to serve as decoy while he and his Republican pals play once again at “hey, let’s help the very rich get nauseatingly richer even faster while dropping crumbs to the idiots in the general public, they’ll buy it and vote for us anyway”.

In the US, surplus embryos are more important than people.

Wow.

Amusing set of values, that.

Look Who's Talking

French-bashing II: the Return of the Vengeance of the Dead Potato--no, really. Don't the US media get tired with that? Is contempt/dislike of the French so ingrained in the collective subconscious of the American media that they must jump at the smallest excuse to start yet another anti-French campaign?

I'll grant you that the most recent, and ongoing one has a bit more beef to it, since it's based on an apparent U-turn by Jacques Chirac on the matter of the international force in Lebanon. Still, while it would be understandable for the general public to misunderstand what's going on behind the scenes, it's unforgivable for the media to feign to have the same analysis.

Let's get back to the facts: when France pushed to get an immediate end to the conflict, it got a "no" from the US, which wanted to allow Israel all the time it needed to "anihilate the Hezbollah's threat" (a really fantastic operation which resulted in the exact opposite: giving the Hezbollah stronger and deeper roots and furthering even more the hatred of the Arab world against Israel, which anyone with brains could have told them would happen). And things dragged on. While France wanted an immediate end to the war, it also wanted a clear agenda, solution and mission for the international force that would get sent to disarm the Hezbollah. For once, Jacques chirac was pretty clear when he said that France would lead an international force, on the strict condition that this force would receive a clear and full mandate from the UNO in order to accomplish its mission.

I believe that anyone in his/her right mind will agree with the fact that sending troops there with no clear mission, and no clear rules of engagment is sending them into a swamp that won't help the situation but worsen it, not to mention be costly in lives for no gain at all.

One of the favorite angles of attack from the US media is that France co-signed the UNO resolution. Well, yes, it was indeed co-written by France. But you forget one very tiny, very very tiny little thing, my dear American media: the other writer of that resolution was none other than your oh-so nice and kind US government. And that oh-so nice and kind US government simply sat down on a solution for as long as it could, and then forced the wording to be as useless as it is. They only came around when Tsahal's operations started being a bit too costly in terms of grisly images of civilians "killed in unfortunate collateral damages". In that moment, France should perhaps have refused to agree to that resolution, but it would have allowed the conflict to continue, and everyone wanted the war to end.

So the war ended. But the terms set by France for its strong implication in the international force were not met, by far. Sending troops with things as they stand would be stupid, and would only result in failure, and in giving even more sway and leverage to terrorists like the Hezbollah (has anyone forgotten the tragedies of the 80s, the kidnappings and deaths of journalists, of soldiers who had no means to carry out their mission, or the problems in Bosnia?). So not sending them is actually the only sensible thing to do.

It will force the US's hand into accepting something that has a chance to work.

It may give a chance to peace (hello there to you all who think that peace will come only after a good all-out war, wouldn't you like it if Israel dumped a nuclear weapon on Iran in your place? I love you too, never fear).

Going in without that, committing troops to a force without the means to carry out its mission would be beyond stupid. Just who is it who's berating France for not making such a moronic blunder?

Wait, aren't those people the very ones who started a war based a a rationale basically made of lies, replaced a tyranny by a bloody civil war, destabilized the whole Middle East in the process, and announced they'd have a quick victory and would be welcomed as saviors by the whole population?

Okay, forget I asked.

(oh, and before you ask, I really dislike Jacques chirac ^_-)

Rising Ghosts

For several years, the world has watched the same pattern emerging in Asia around August 9th and the anniversary of the end of WWII in Japan.

For many reasons, most of them bad, Japanese Prime Ministers have paid official visits to the Yasukuni Shrine.

For many reasons, most of them bad, China has reacted with growing vehemence and violence to these visits, joined by other countries like South Korea

Why?

Because the Yasukuni Shrine is not only the resting place for the souls of all the men sacrificed on the altar of war and to satisfy the ambitions of a select few, but also a place where the souls of war criminals, monsters and torturers were smuggled in what amounts to me to the befouling of a sacred place. I have yet to understand why the Shinto priests in charge of the shrine allowed this to happen. Had this not taken place, there would be no controversy today, and official visits to Yasukuni could happen without anyone being able to seize on the excuse to attack Japan for their own purposes, which often have little to do with the vocal protestations concerning the horrible crimes of the past.

Don’t mistake me, I believe that official visits to Yasukuni shouldn’t take place so long as the souls of the 14 great war criminals are enshrined there. I believe the honor and pride of Japan’s government would be in finding a way to have those souls erased from the list of names in Yaskuni. Still, I find it too easy to simply drink the words that come from China without trying to analyze the whys and wherefores, the more so since those visits to Yasukuni by Japan’s first ministers have not always elicited such a response by China.

When you think about it, outraged reactions which give rise to a dwelling on past wars and past crimes are a win-win for China’s so nice and democratic government: you gather people around the idea of nationalism, you push them to look at their “national pride” (how often has national pride been the equivalent of blind stupidity? Far too often…) instead of on their everyday life and the conditions they exist in. It focuses anger and frustrations on an outside element and thus prevents it from being lashed out at what caused it. In a fantastically convenient fashion, it gives the Chinese government yet another way to control its population and keep it on a tight leash. Rub the wounds with polluted mud, help them fester, and as the pain artificially grows, everything else is eclipsed. Not exactly beautiful, but frighteningly efficient. And people work. People swallow that fish with greedy appetite, unfortunately.

As to Japan’s first minister, I’m sorry, but all the justifications running along the lines of “we’ll do what we want on our soil, and we won’t be ordered around by China or others” are just empty rationalization of what is at best a mistake, and at worst a part of the manipulation that’s been aiming at getting a fundamental change in Japan’s constitution—a change that would once again allow Japan to lead offensive military actions, thus breaking a taboo dating back to the end of WWII.

Yanking history aside, and unmaking what had been, in my humble opinion, one of the very few good sides to the US occupation of Japan on the eve of the war’s end. Japan had become the first pacific country, gaining its place in the international community through diplomacy, through its financial contributions to positive project at UNO…it was the way to go, the path to follow. But of course, warmongers with a bad ego and pride problem will never be satisfied with that (not manly enough, you know—just like the morons who need big cars to compensate for their self-perceived lack of masculinity). Well, warmongers, ego bruised fools, and people thirsting after power who know how to use tools to further their own interests. And so, some in Japan have been pushing for that fundamental change. In parallel, the prime minister of Japan stubbornly insist on visiting Yasukuni each year, aware of what it will trigger, and most likely counting on it, and counting on how that will be received by the Japanese population. If someone wanted to manipulate people in Japan, to rekindle the infamous “national pride”, they wouldn’t do it any other way.

All in all, those visits to Yasukuni serve everyone’s purposes: China, those who believe Japan should change, and revert back to what it was…

When the true, honourable thing to do would simply be to strike off the war criminals’ names from the list of the souls resting at Yasukuni, and then to continue to visit the shrine. Those criminals are a stain on the shrine, a befouling of all the other deads’ resting place. So, yes, striking off those names from the list would be the honourable thing to do.

Is there anyone who has enough honour and strength in the Japanese governement to do that?

Meanwhile, in Gaza…

Everyday life goes on. The Hamas sends rockets on Israeli villages near the border. Tsahal retaliates.

While our exalted world leaders and their proxies (in this instance the interior ministers and security people) toy with airports and force ludicrous security measures on flights, that nice little endless “skirmish” goes on.

While airport authorities and security bozos play at “you can’t bring in the cabin a MP3 player, too dangerous, but you can bring inside a laptop” (hello? Did any of these fools ever attend a basic electronics class?) or the other nice game of “you can’t bring in any liquid, but if an infant’s along you can bring milk if you taste it to prove it’s milk” (hello again, I can also taste my water bottle to prove you it’s genuine, thanks!), or even “ah, but it’s becoming troublesome for the airport shops, so maybe we should consider saying liquid’s okay so long as you bought it in the airport where it’s sold 10 times higher than in any normal shop, yeah, they’ll buy the fact that it’s still more secure that way”,

While they ground planes in Boston because a depressive passenger behaved threateningly and brandished matches, lubricant and I don’t remember what else, thus demonstrating the futility of the “security measures” imposed on passengers bound for the UK, the US and Canada (I don’t see all the security goons offering to compensate for the loss of time, of money and the worry caused to travellers, their families and all those who wait for them and anguish when they don’t see them arriving as they are grounded at their departure location because of their so nice security measures),

While Sarko tries to emulate W and his laughable “nation at war” attitude,

Well, our dear "border skirmish" that refuses to be labelled a war goes on between Tsahal, the Hamas and other fanatics.

The civilians keep being in the middle, and keep being the ones to suffer, to lose everything and to die.

And Gaza continues its painstakingly slow agony while the Great Eye of the media is turned elsewhere.

And the international community continues feigning to ignore what’s going on there. It’s so much more convenient.

And people’s hearts die.

And people’s hatred grows.

And new terrorists are bound, with every civilian killed.

With every house destroyed.

Insanity rules.

And chaos laughs at us all.

Earthsea : There Be Dragons...

...Whose danger is greater than you think, and whose nature you wouldn't, at first, suspect.

It’s been some days now, since Miyazaki Goro’s first movie premiered in Japan. Gendo Senki is based on the Tales of Earthsea books by Ursula K. Le Guin.

This cycle of four books is, in my opinion, one of the very best fantasy has to offer. I read it almost twenty years ago, when I was a surly and haughty teenager. I remember how Ged appealed to me and talked to me. Many details of the plot, many details of the characters have gathered so much dust in the corners of my memory that they’ve become fuzzy, and can no longer be made into something coherent or clear. But what I have kept to this day, and will always keep in my heart, are the feelings, the emotions the books gifted me with. The sensation of a unique atmosphere, the very feeling of that universe, and of the people living in it.

To be honest, I had never really wondered about the color of the characters’ skin. It’s not something which bothers me or matters to me. I don’t remember feeling awkward or wondering what was going on at having characters which were mostly dark in color. I am probably one of those blind, white fools who can afford not to care (yes, I do happen to think that some people are so keen on this issue that they become abrasive and trigger a rejection reaction or a “gods, just leave it be” sigh), but since the moment I started reading fantasy, I don’t ever remember caring about the color of the skin characters had. The only exception to that being the Lord of the Rings, where Tolkien’s depiction of the Haradrim was really a clear contrast and did feel completely unbalanced.

Even when I write, I don’t take particular care about my characters’ skin color: I visualize my character. I see them, I feel them. They live inside me. If they wear a white skin, they are white. If they wear a dark brown skin, they are dark brown. If they wear a black skin, they are black. It’s not something conscious. I am not trying to maintain a ratio or a balance, or to push anything like that. To me, characters should be the way they want to be (characters do have a life and a will of their own, as most writers know), not forced into being what they didn’t want to be, or you risk getting an unbalanced work, with characters completely askew.

Still, I was ecstatic when I heard that “Miyazaki” would do the movie. Here was the perfect combination: one of the most wonderful books cycle I had read and one of the best anime film makers there was coming together. Then, when I gathered some information about the coming movie, I did realize that there had been an abysmally bad US mini-series, and that there was a kind of racial pitfall in the adaptation. As explained above, I still fail to understand why people will be so vocal about the issue, that they will push away people who would otherwise support what they say.

Anyway. First, I realized that Miyazaki junior would do the movie. Then, I read about the father – son dispute. I found that extremely sad and a waste. I don’t understand the roots of this, and likely never will—and it’s far better that way. From my understanding of the work’s progress, things went as they often do: quickly, and rather smoothly (of you can ever call the production of an anime movie “smooth”, that is). What hints and bits I could see looked rather nice to me.

Then the movie premiered in Japan. People saw it, and comments started popping up here and there.

Then Ursula Le Guin, who had seen it before its debut, came public with her own review and comment of the movie. So naturally I went to her web site, and read it, dreading what I would find. For all those who haven’t read it yet, it’s here.

Her review leaves me with the following thoughts:

It's a pity Mrs. Le Guin had to stand in the middle of a dispute between father and son. It's even more a pity that Miyazaki Hayao changed his mind on retiring after a decision was made to have his son do the movie.

However, the movie, as I understand it, has received quite a few good reviews in Japan. I, for one, will give it the fair chance it does deserve. As to the Earthsea books, as stated above I loved them when I read them, so many years ago. The details and even the plot are now fuzzy in my memory. So I will take this move and watch it as it is: Miyazaki Goro’s vision of the cycle, and not as a completely faithful shifting of the books to the screen.

Adaptation is a tricky business. Nobody is ever happy with it. If you stick to the work you're adapting too closely (hello, Saint Seiya Hades: Meikai-hen--if you've read my review of those OVAs, you know I do agree that the adaptation was just inexistent), you're cursed for being an incompetent script writer without a single ounce of talent or creativity. If you stray too far, then you're accused of betraying the original work. It seems to me like a doomed job. Even more so, when adaptation is done by someone from a culture very different from yours, and whose view of your work you can't really know--and when the adaptation is done primarily for a people whose culture is deeply different too.

I think, what amazes me the most, is that people would write Mrs Le Guin to ask her questions about the movie. As she rightly says, she's not the movie's author, or the movie's script writer, or the one who did the adaptation. Bothering her with questions is futile, and, if she didn't receive the movie in a favorable light, can only lead to rubbing more salt on the wound.

Three-Edged Sword

Reflecting back on the contents of TV series which have gained fame and have been watched by millions in the US, I can’t help but wonder: is the public simply blind, or do the authors overestimate its capacity to analyze what it sees and hears?

Take the X-Files, or Babylon 5 for instance. The contents of those shows, the material in there should have awoken people who watched them, should have made them aware of the society they live in, of the blanket of propaganda that is Georges W. Bush’s Administration main method of doing politics.

This is not only true for domains like the military and the “war on terror” flag raised every time the Republicans feel threatened—ever wondered at the timing and scale of chaos following the thwarting of that plot to blow up airliners over the Atlantic? Ever put that together with the coming election in November, and the difficult position the Republicans found themselves in until they so conveniently could get back to whipping that poor dead “war on terror” horse?

It’s also true in domains like economy and the One Allowed Line of Thought that states that completely unfettered market economy is good for humanity, and that the market is good for all of us, and will benefit us all. It’s true when it comes to unravelling this despicable deception called “the American Dream.”

Oh yes, there’s all that in TV series, and more. Let me quote you one of the most disturbing exchanges in Babylon 5, taking place between John Sheridan, Captain of the station, and Julie Musante, official envoy from the Ministry of Peace on Earth:

JM -“Earth doesn't have homeless. We don't have the problem. Well, yes, there are some displaced people, here and there, but they've chosen to be in their position. They're either lazy or they're criminal or they're mentally unstable.”
JS - “They can't get a job.”
JM - “Earth-gov has promised a job to everyone that wants one. So, if someone doesn't have a job, they must not want one.”
(…)
JS - “Poverty?”
JM -“It's the same.”
JS - “Crime?”
JM -“Yes, there is some, but it's all caused by the mentally unstable. And we've just instituted correctional centers to filter them out at an early age.”
JS - “Prejudice?”
JM -“No, we are just one happy planet”

(JM: Julie Musante, JS: John Sheridan, from Babylon 5’s Voices of Authority)

Rings a bell? Ever heard those lines or much the same from politicians near you? From people thirsting after an easy victory in elections? From senators or congressmen trying to push for a new law to be voted?

And there is more, way more to find. Babylon 5’s Lines of Communications is an exercise in unravelling the tapestry of lies and propaganda spun by the likes of Fox News. Starting with so-called journalists claiming, ”Our job, as always, is simply to state the facts and let the truth attend to itself,” the episode is a brilliant demonstration of just how you nudge the facts this way and that, how you cut interviews just so and edit videos this way to get the “truth” you were aiming for.

The X-Files’s “Redux” shows us a stunning summary of the US governments’ actions in the last 60 years, which, while certainly pushed to suit the author’s scenario, ought to at least shake people, and make them wonder about what has been done in their name, about what the US government has been doing in the world since World War II.

There is much, much more where that came from.

Desperate Housewives is an exercise in demolition of the righteous and hypocritical bigots that constitute the upper-middle class. Every single episode happily tramples down upon the lies and clichés such people entertain about themselves. Every single episode should send those people screaming in horror.

And yet, have these shows changed anything? Sometimes, I really question the ability of people to think, and reflect on what they see.

Yes, those shows are fiction, and they do not show you “the truth”. But they aim to shake easy certainties, and to make you question what you’re being told, to make you think, to force you to make yourself an opinion instead of blindly swallowing down anything spewed out by spokespersons with bovine zeal.

When I watched Babylon 5 for the first time, it was in Detroit, at a friend’s house. When I was done, I asked him: “do you realize what it is that’s shown you? Do you realize how it’s a slap in the face that undoes the way the American people just allow themselves to be led by the nose by people who only look to their own interest?” He told me that, yes, he did realize the strength of what was being shown in that TV series. But I fear he’s an exception. Oh, there must be hundreds of thousands of such exceptions, but I’m afraid they’re just a drop in the ocean of three hundred million people that comprise the United States of America.

And above all, I fear that most people in the US and elsewhere watch TV series for the fun of it, and switch off their brains when they do so—that people refuse to reflect on what’s going on around them, refuse to use the material they’re being given to question the pre-digested “truths” delivered by propaganda machines like Fox News and others. I fear that people just consider that fiction is fiction, period, and not meant to have a serious impact on “reality”. That’s a terrible mistake.

Authors of shows like Babylon 5 do want you to use your mind, to use what they showed you to challenge and question what happens around you.

When I write stories, I place elements that reflect on the world I live in. I want people to think, to question. I don’t care if in the end they agree with me or not, I’m not aiming to win any kind of election. No, what I want is for people to make their own mind, make their own opinion, instead of blindly accepting whatever is being handed to them.

Do people realize that?

Are people willing to make the effort of applying what they see, what is questioned in a TV series to challenge their everyday reality?

I wish I knew. I wish I understood how people work in that regard.

“Understanding,” as Ambassador Kosh Naranek rightly says, “is a three-edge sword: your side, their side and the truth.”

UNO : This Mirror Some so Love to Scorn

Not exactly related to current news, even though inspired by the very late vote on a resolution calling for the end of the conflict between Tsahal and the Hezbollah in Lebanon. When hearing Secretary General Annan’s final comment, which was along the lines of : “I would be remiss in my duty if I didn’t tell you how disappointed I am that this vote came so late,” I was reminded about how my most beloved US media would likely again report this long, way too long wait for a UNO resolution.

With dripping sarcasm, of course.

Fox News and the Wall Street Journal, not to mention the New York Post, those oh so balanced and objective masterpieces of manipulation^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H ooops, I mean professional journalism, will certainly not fail me in their recounting of this agonizing path that the UNO stumbled and drudged through to finally reach their goal.

They will scorn. They will mock, and they will spit all the contempt they have packed in the sewers they use as brains. And yet, there is a certain poetic justice in watching those mindless, raving followers of the neo-cons reviling the UNO—not that they’d realize it, or that the blind crowds of morons who watch and read them would notice it either. But, if you just stop to think about it, when all those “media” ridicule the UNO, well, they’re just ridiculing the US.

After all, who keeps blocking the UNO’s work?

Who has prevented a resolution on Lebanon to be voted for weeks (probably so that Israel could do their job for them and fight the war they’re busy losing in Irak)?

Why, none other than the US authorities and their fantastic ambassador, Mr John Bolton.

When the US government decided to send to the UNO a man who despises the organization and dreams of nothing more than to see it trampled and destroyed,

When the US is a permanent member of the Security Council enjoying the right to veto anything that displeases them,

When the US has been using the veto weapon again and again, hampering the work of the UNO with all it had along the years,

Well, what else can you conclude when you analyze the UNO’s actions, other than it’s being hopelessly inefficient?

This is perfectly true.

This is also thanks to the good work of the US, which doesn’t want the UNO, which hates the UNO, because even though it can block anything coming to the Security Council, others can also block stuff it could bring on the table.

The UNO is nothing more than what the nations which compose it make it. It’s no more efficient or inefficient, inept or fantastic than what the nation which compose it allow it to be. And this is even truer for those who sit on the Security Council with a permanent membership and the dreaded right to veto any resolution—the US first, and foremost among them.

The UNO, the one place where all the nations come and meet, and try to settle disputes, stop wars, and prevent them from starting (well, almost all nations—Israel, for instance, always declined to be a member, one wonders why, really…). It’s no surprise the current US government led by W and his shadows (Mr Cheney, where are you? Still shooting your pals at your little hunting parties? How are Haliburton’s benefits these days?) hate it and sabotage it through any means at their disposal. The current US government, whose strings are pulled by the likes of the madmen called the neo-cons, wants nothing to do with anything remotely resembling multilateralism. They want nothing where the opinion of others really matter.

As their friendship with Tony B clearly demonstrates, what the US wants is dogs which wag their tail when they speak, drool a bit and reflect back to them the fact that they’re the best, the most intelligent, that they’re right, and of course they’re winning and all’s well in the world.

So, please, demolish the UNO, my dear, balanced US media. Demolish away.

You’re only breaking your own image.

Please, do carry on, while I contemplate the latest feat of war pulled by Tsahal when it bombed a convoy of civilians and Lebanese army fleeing the war in Southern Lebanon, despite having been warned, and having agreed to allow the convoy to pass unarmed.

No Comment

Israel Asks U.S. to Ship Rockets With Wide Blast

Israel has asked the Bush administration to speed delivery of short-range antipersonnel rockets armed with cluster munitions (...)

(...) The rockets, while they would be very effective against hidden missile launchers, officials say, are fired by the dozen and could be expected to cause civilian casualties if used against targets in populated areas. Israel is asking for the rockets now because it has been unable to suppress Hezbollah’s Katyusha rocket attacks in the month-old conflict by using bombs dropped from aircraft and other types of artillery, the officials said. (...)

(...) During much of the 1980’s, the United States maintained a moratorium on selling cluster munitions to Israel, following disclosures that civilians in Lebanon had been killed with the weapons during the 1982 Israeli invasion. But the moratorium was lifted late in the Reagan administration, and since then, the United States has sold Israel some types of cluster munitions, the senior official said. (...)

(...) While Bush administration officials have criticized Israeli strikes that have caused civilian casualties, they have also backed the offensive against Hezbollah by rushing arms shipments to the region. Last month the administration approved a shipment of precision-guided munitions, which one senior official said this week included at least 25 of the 5,000-pound “bunker-buster” bombs.

Last month, the advocacy group Human Rights Watch said its researchers had uncovered evidence that Israel had fired cluster munitions on July 19 at the Lebanese village of Bilda, which the group said had killed one civilian and wounded at least 12 others, including 7 children. (...)

(...) After the Reagan administration determined in 1982 that the cluster munitions had been used by Israel against civilian areas, the delivery of the artillery shells containing the munitions to Israel was suspended.

Israel was found to have violated a 1976 agreement with the United States in which it had agreed only to use cluster munitions against Arab armies and against clearly defined military targets. (...)

Source: Today's edition of the New York Times

Tsahal, Humanitarian Aid Deluxe ™ !

Partisan people would certainly tell you Israel is perfecting its trap on the South of Lebanon, locking in countless civilians, cut out from all help and hope. But I’m telling you, those partisan, and often outright anti-semitic people are once again trying to fool European public opinions, and to manipulate the West into thinking Israel and Tsahal are no more innocent in the death of civilians on one side of the border than the Hezbollah is on the other side of that border.

There could be nothing further from the truth.

Can’t you see what’s happening? Israel has locked out Southern Lebanon, Tsahal has severed that small piece of land and all those who are unhappy enough to live in it from the world. Any vehicle spotted there will be targeted and destroyed. Bombed. But that’s only natural. After all, even though those vehicles would be ambulances bearing the Red Cross, or humanitarian convoys bearing the UNO or well-known insignias like Doctors Without Borders could very well have been hijacked by those terrorists of the Hezbollah. There’s no way to tell! And if there’s no way to tell, the safest way to deal with the issue is to blow the thing to smithereens, and then investigate. Simple as that, as the nice military spokesperson explained on how the Israeli jets target civilian buildings and fire. When you don’t know, you fire, because, well, you don’t know, and it’s best to act.

So, what Israel’s really doing while warning it will blindly destroy any vehicle spotted in Southern Lebanon is really saving the lives of all those good and kind-hearted people of humanitarian organizations. Really. And don’t worry about the civilians trapped in the war zone. Even though the Red Cross has officially declared there were more than a hundred thousand people still stuck in there, unable to flee or do anything other than to wait until they get killed like rats, well, no worries. Tsahal is up to the challenge.

Of course. What were you thinking?

Of course Tsahal and the Israeli government do realize that that hundred thousand people will starve, get sick and die if nobody brings them essential supplies, food, water and medicine. Jeez, you shouldn’t underestimate Tsahal like that, and allow yourself to be brainwashed by the global partisan media. They’re all against Israel and Tsahal, didn’t you notice? They feed you nothing but lies, and exaggerations. Truly. Cross my heart. So, I’ll spell it for you, and forever dispel the lies dripping from the media: there is nothing to fear, Tsahal declared that Southern Lebanon is a dead zone for anyone who’d try to move in but them. So it’s all very logical, rational, and so thoughtful and generous of Tsahal and Israel, really. By forbidding anyone to move in the zone, they save their lives. But Tsahal remains free to move, so they’ll go on those dangerous, destroyed roads and bridges (that they themselves destroyed), risking their lives to bring all the humanitarian aid to the civilans themselves.

Isn’t it wonderful?

And with that, you kill two bords with the same stone. In the same time, they’ll be able to investigate all the fishy buildings, and investigate all the people who pretend to be civilians but in truth are nothing other than Hezbollah-supporting scum—and certainly even Hezbollah members for a good part. Yeah. A hundred thousand civilians? Hm, I think not. Many must be terrorists in hiding, I’m sure. Better to be on the safe side. As they say, better to err on the side of caution.

If you’re not sure, shoot it.

Isn’t it what people who claim to hold the moral high ground do?

That’s why Tsahal is really doing something wonderful. That’s why I’m sure Israel will be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize next year. No doubt about that.

Naaan-te ne! (just kidding)

Is Fantasy That Hard ?

A strange question, maybe, but bear with me. It just popped inside my baked brain while I was watching an episode of Stargate Atlantis.

There are quite a few science-fiction shows out there, ranging from awful to good, very good and even fantastic and enthralling. The various incarnations of Star Trek are of course the most famous of the lot, but there are other, very, very good TV series doing justice to the genre. Farscape, Taken, Odyssey 5, The 4400, and Babylon 5—the greatest title of SF and fiction I’ve ever had the pleasure to watch on TV.

When you think about it, there has always been a wealth of SF shows out there, and for a very long time. Dating back to the Star Trek, The Original Series and Battle Ship Galactica or even Lost in Space (although I wouldn’t call that good…but then you need also titles to fill the “awful” category ^^;;; ), you’ll find them if you just look around the corner. They’re all there, some have lulled or rocked our teenage years or our childhood. Some have entranced our hours of leisure on evenings after hard days of work. In a way, they’re part of the landscape, and you really can find the very best pieces of writing, of acting and directing in there.

Inspired scenarios, fantastic characters, detailed universes, coherent stories that span five seasons (this is a shameless B5 plug), SF TV series have it all—well, not all of them, but you can find it.

Now, when I turn my attention on fantasy shows—heroic fantasy TV series, I come out empty-handed. Well, you have shows like Buffy or Angel, but to me they belong to the urban fantasy genre, trendy modern vampire thingies. Oh, don’t mistake me, I love those two shows, I’ve enjoyed them to death and I believe they’re superb bits of story-telling and character-building, but I don’t think they’re true fantasy. Even a small jewel like Carnivale isn’t what I call Fantasy.

So, what’s out there that could qualify? Well, I guess you could consider shows like Hercules, Dar or Xena, although to me they’re more like the twisting and (ab)using of Greek mythology. That’s not to say dialogues in there aren’t witty, or funny, or that characters are uninteresting or uninspiring, not at all. Those shows can be very much enjoyable, be relaxing, but they’re not fantasy to me, not really. Or rather, it’s second degree parodic fantasy, not serious, honest-to-god fantasy.

With that in mind, I still can’t put my finger on any real TV series that’s truly rooted in the fantasy genre. And I can’t help wondering why. Is it the settings? The costumes? I’d think not. The themes? No way, SF has enough disturbing themes to play with, I don’t see why fantasy couldn’t dabble with its darker aspects as well. What, then? Coherent universes? Strong stories? The fantasy genre does have that aplenty. But what have TV producers done with it? They have mangled and completely botched a mini on Ursula Le Guin’s Earthsea Quartet. Completely betrayed the author’s work. I have yet to understand why.

Why don’t TV producers use the fantastic resources at hand? Why not turn to the stories of Robin Hobb, Tad Williams or even, for the lighter aspects, David Eddings? Do the authors refuse to sell the rights to adapt their works in TV series? Are those universes too coherent, to solid and well built for the producers? Can’t they make the bet that they can gather a crowd of intelligent viewers able and willing to follow a plot-driven show during multiple seasons? It would seem to me that Babylon 5 has proved that there is an audience for such shows.

And just for your information, dear Hollywood producers, check out the fantastic profits Japanese animes make, whose main characteristics for highly popular shows like Bleach are to be both plot and character-driven and to last for quite a few seasons with an ever growing fandom.

No matter how I try, I don’t understand the producers’ timidity in the area of fantasy. Could it be that some people have decided that it wasn’t mainstream enough? Please, check the ratings of The Lord of the Rings and the Harry Potter movies if that’s what’s stopping you. Truly, I’d like to know why nobody in Hollywood is seriously going for the fantasy genre—except to tackle parodic fantasy.

Dear producers, dear publishers, please don’t forget: the public’s tastes aren’t always restricted to what you dictate it is or should be. Trust me, people can be full of surprises. People can like deep, intricate and plot-driven shows whose stories span several seasons. Oh yes, they can.

Babylon 5 has proved that, more than once.

Forty-Nine Seconds

It was the time yesterday’s evening news had to spare to remind viewers that on August 6th, 1945, what counts among the most horrible crimes against humanity was committed.

August 6th, 1945. The day a light as bright as the sun's crushed Hiroshima. The day the US dropped a gift for hundreds of thousands of civilians living in that area. Oh, I know, it was war. A war that couldn’t seem to end, whose thirst for blood and death couldn’t seem to be sated. A war of madness, of insanity which manifested in atrocities committed by the Japanese army on Chinese and Korean soil. I know all that, and it’s very clear that the Japanese Army leaders were as evil as they were blind and crazy. War criminals, they were. Bloodthistry madmen who deluded themselves into thinking they could come back to the blessed times of the Tokugawa Dynasty. Before the black ships came into Kyoto bay.

Before the US destroyed a centuries-old status-quo and plunged the Japanese civilisation into a chaos that’s still plaguing it today. But then, if it had only been a matter of annihilating one’s enemies through conventional means, if it had been simple bombing of cities back to the stone age, it would have been…simple, classical acts of war, I guess. Like the bombing of Dresde even though Hitler’s Nazi Germany had already lost the war, if you want. Oh, yeah, war is nothing grand or noble or exciting. War is just ugliness, slaughtering, killings, people crying their souls and their guts out, agonizing for hours and days on end, wetting their pants and dying bereft of their humanity and dignity. Did you ever think otherwise? Ah, then you must be one of the morons who find Chuck Norris and Jean-Claude Vandamme manly. Please, just go away, reading this will only confuse your deficient brains. Thank you.

But I digress.

So, Belgian TV news had only about forty-nine seconds to spare for an event that has shaped the world as we know it for scores of years, and is likely to continue shaping it for a long time.

The use of a nuclear weapon.

On a civilian target.

Because the US unleashed a terror nobody suspected, the world has lived under a shroud of dread. Because horror gained a face and a name, hundreds of thousands of faces whose skin started to come off even as they burnt from within and were vomiting blood, spitting out their guts without even knowing what was happening to them or why. Because that horror continued for dozens of years, accompanied by US military scientific personnel which came not to try to heal but to study those fantastic, unhoped-for guinea-pigs—to watch them agonize, to measure rates of this and that in their bloodstreams while they were dying, and clinging to the belief that the men in white blouses would somehow save them and alleviate their excruciating pain.

Because of that monstrosity, powers have watched themselves, eyed themselves without daring to move. Common analysis of the event says it spared us a nuclear World War III. It’s likely it’s absolutely correct. Common analysis of the event goes on to usually consider that, in that way, it was worth it. Because it served to silence the world, to strike it so hard that nobody ever dared repeat that oh-so proud feat of arms. I am sorry, but I refuse to rationalize that event—to view it in a positive light. I think, we can never fully apprehend the horror of what happened then. Of what all those people endured. Of unspeakable terror and suffering. But we can at least try. We can read manga like Gen of Hiroshima, told by a survivor of the bomb. We can refuse to close our eyes when the author starts drawing how people’s face started melting and coming off. And we can stop hiding behind easy rationalizations.

There is no excuse for using that weapon. Such things should be forbidden. Such things should be tried, and punished. It doesn’t matter that the enemy was criminally insane and cruel beyond depiction. It doesn’t give you the right to be like the enemy, to be the enemy. To descend at the enemy’s level. An eye for an eye. I know of nothing more barbaric than that. Becoming the enemy in order to defeat it is being defeated. It’s losing oneself and one’s values. There is no victory possible once you’ve gone down that road. None.

Sixty-one years later, I wonder whether we have learnt anything. Some people in Japan are arguing to leave the stance of peace Japan embraced when recovering from the war’s aftermath. Some in Japan advocate for regaining a “normal approach” to the army. That means, considering the use of weapons, of technologies which shattered Japan and tore through the very fabric of life.

Sixty-one years later, a mad fanatic in Iran dreams of getting his claws on a nuclear weapon so he can destroy Israel and dominate the Middle-East. But nobody is even tip-toeing in his direction. Oh no. They’re too busy destroying Lebanon, it’s so much easier…

Sixty-one years later, I wonder where the USSR’s nuclear arsenal has gone. I wonder if anyone in China or North Korea could make use of nuclear devices, and I can’t shake the feeling that it’s not impossible.

Sixty-one years later, the evening news on TV had about forty-nine seconds to spare for an uninteresting event that devastated the lives of hundreds of thousands of people.

Not even one minute.

Forty-nine seconds

Perilous Prequels Galore

It seems to be the trend of the days. Prequels, be it in US TV series, movies or in manga and anime. Quite frankly, I find myself wondering what’s going on through the producers’ brains.

Granted, it’s easier to come up with a prequel: the universe is set, you can reuse characters that are already well established and popular. You can do what you didn’t do before, either because technology of the time didn’t allow you to, or because you simply didn’t think of it (or couldn’t do it because of the time’s constraints in terms of morals, and righteousness). Still, while these are time and cost-efficient criteria, there are others to consider:

Fanfictions, for one. Oh yes, you heard me. Fanfictions, and those who write them. Most of the great titles, be it in US TV series or anime/manga, have attracted writers from all over the fandom spectrum. Between themselves, they’ve extended the existing universes, studied characters to death, built prequels and side-stories. Sometimes, but more rarely so, they’ve dabbled in sequels. In spite of the Correct Opinion ™ brandished in the publishing world, some of those fanfiction authors are very good and talented writers. Of course, a great many are just kids and teens spewing out their (often incoherent) fantasies on the internet, realizing their own dreams of being heroes or the beloved/whatever of heroes or heroines they idolize. It would be stupid to ignore that or not to acknowledge it.

Yet, in the vast ocean of fanfictions, there are shining jewels who do more than justice to the title that inspired them. This I s not a popular opinion in the publishing world, and yet it’s the truth. After all, what do the franchised writers do when they write novels for TSR, and other companies? What do the authors of Star Trek, Star Wars DragonLance, Forgotten Realms novels write, other than fanfiction? Are they not writing about a universe they didn’t create, using characters and concepts they didn’t create?

But enough with my rambling on fanfiction. If I continue, I’ll be telling you all about what I think of the odds of getting published when you write something original as a first novel and you’re not sponsored by X or Y (X or Y being someone high placed in the publishing world, a critic, a professor in some university or another popular writer). This is supposed to be about prequels.

Star Trek prequels among them. To tell you the truth, while I suppose I can be called a geek, I am in no way a Trekkie (or a Trekker). I have watched with quite a bit of pleasure St TNG, ST DS9 and parts of ST Voyager (my memories of ST TOS are foggier, and I know for a fact I’d have a bit of difficulty enjoying it now—even though I did love what I could catch of it as a child). But I have not, and will most likely never watch a single episode of ST Enterprise, and I’m not sure I’ll want to watch the 11th movie in the works under the direction of JJ Abrams who came up with Lost (I have yet to understand the appeal of that series, but never mind—the fact that he’s also the writer of crap like Mission Impossible 3, the abysmally awful movie created for the sole glory of a totally egocentric sect member like Tom Cruise alone makes my skin crawl in disgust). Beyond my doubts and qualms about JJ Abrams, the concept of yet another prequel irks me. Are Hollywood’s screenwriters so unimaginative that they need to go back and drape themselves with a universe and characters not their own?

What’s the use of a prequel recounting Kirk’s and Spock’s first mission in deep space? Oh, I’m sure it can be interesting, but let me tell you one thing: it’s been done already. It has been written, and probably a thousand times already. All those possibilities have been explored to death by fanfiction writers. The odds of coming up with something original in that regard are very small, if not outright null. Sure, it’s bound to be much easier, and it’s bound to be really convenient if in doing this you can do some kind of reboot on the series’ concepts. That’ll allow you to get rid of continuity and coherence, so you can write what you want. But that’s what fanfiction writers do. Taking a universe, twisting it to suit one’s vision and making it your own. While I have no problem with that (as long as it’s well done)—after all I spend my time doing this when I write—I have a problem with the owner of a universe abandoning the canon of their work, changing the foundations as if what had come before had become either obsolete, or inconvenient. You should be able to work with respect to the concepts. You should be able to look forward, and advance using the guidelines set before you came, and build ahead. If you’re a professional, you should be able to do so.

And quite frankly, prequels are very difficult to turn into a success. To be popular and interesting, they need to be intermingled with an ongoing story that is making the universe itself progress. They cannot stand alone, cut out from the flow of a forward-going story. They need to come in flashbacks, not to stand alone and estranged from everything. People like Tite Kubo (Bleach anyone?) and the anime directors of Bleach TV have shown themselves to be masters in that most delicate of arts. JMS has done a superb job of prequel building with In the Beginning in the Babylon 5 universe. That was fantastic work, and should be the example of how one does prequels, and how one uses them to enrich one’s universe. The articulation of that movie in the chronological development of the story was masterful. Those who exploit the Star Trek franchise…have yet to show talent in that regard. And the direction that’s being taken is not, imho, the right one.

From TV series to anime and manga. Unfortunately, the ST owners aren’t the only ones to have decided to exploit this avenue. A certain Masami Kurumada is busy trampling his own work in Japan, for reasons that are completely beyond me. A mediocre artist at best, Masami Kurumada had had one moment of inspiration, twenty and some years ago when he created Saint Seiya. That fantastic, epic story upheld my years of hardship in the university, lifted me up, inspired me. There was depth and vision there, characters and a compelling universe that was a mixture of all the mythologies he could grab at. The story ended in the early 90s. Some twenty years later, a push for a revival was made in Japan. Alas, Saint Seiya was no longer of interest for its creator, who had found his path in life with wrestling and drinking lots of beers. Still, money is always welcome, and the revival did happen.

The Tenkai-hen Jôsô movie was made. The beginnings of a sequel, and a beautiful job it was. But the author, who declined to participate in its making beyond a fuzzy outline in the first place, decided he didn’t like it. And Mr Kurumada decided he’d redo everything. Because of the way he ended his story twenty years before, he decided to reboot, and to start his sequel with a prequel. And boy, is it bad! Kurumada’s art hasn’t become any better with time, but then it would have been stupid to expect that. But the story-telling…if you can still call that story-telling… The dialogues, the characters… Ugh. Again, as with Star Trek, Mr Kurumada, please, spare us the pain. What you’re babbling about and spewing out has been done already, and way better than you can ever hope to do. Fanfiction writers have been there for ages. I know it’s easier to do that, I know it demands far less effort to go into a prequel, and that your interest in Saint Seiya isn’t enough to push you to do a good job on a sequel. But then, please, just stop your Next Dimension horror. We don’t need it. The world, I assure you, has no need for it.

Prequels are very difficult to do properly. They’re very tricky to integrate in a work. The timing, the intermingling, all of it is very delicate work. It demands talent.

Tite Kubo has it. J. Michael Straczinski has it. It may be Mr Abrams has it, but even if he has, the cut in the Star Trek flow is such that he can only fail. He cannot integrate his movie in anything: there is no ST TV series running. There is nothing beyond DS9 and Voyager. It’s as if ST had just stopped—or died. Reminiscing and focusing on the past in the void is no good. As to Mr Kurumada…well, the 8 pages of garbage he spewed out a few days ago are ample proof of his total lack of interest or talent where Saint Seiya is concerned. That is as pathetic as it’s a heart-breaker.

Rhetorics

I’m fast getting weary of these—well, no, okay, not weary. Not even exhausted. Pissed off? No, it’s worse. I’m sick of hearing the same empty justifications spewed out again and again by people who have as much credibility as W shouting his “Bring’em on!” to the world (and getting them full in the face, as requested).

If only the spokespersons of Tsahal, among whom Ehoud Olmert seems to have gained a place (wait, wasn’t he supposed to be Prime Minister, instead of Deluxe Army Lackey?) would just shut the fuck up…

I have enough of hearing how Israel is careful in selecting its targets, in having a second recognition before striking. They’re just making it worse. If they check twice that they’re going to bomb a UNIFIL building, an ambulance, a humanitarian convoy or a truck where workers are working to put a fruit harvest inside, well… yeah, I think that counts as making it worse.

Just as the ludicrous claim that they just want to take care of the threat of Hezbollah in South Lebanon. Why are they attacking Christian quarters in Beirut, then? Why did they attack cities and infrastructures in the North? Why did they just cut off Beirut from the outside world, destroying the last highway that was an escape route for civilians to flee the living hell their home has become? So that they can drop tracts warning the same civilians of a coming bombardment and advising them to flee via escape routes that no longer exist?

I know I’m sounding like a broken record right now, but that’s because Tsahal and its Deluxe Lackey, Ehoud Olmert, are busy being a broken record themselves.

Why do they cling to this stupid discourse? Do they think they can fool anyone other than their own extremists, and all those who believe that the only good Muslim is a dead Muslim? I stumbled on such a person’s prose today, and quite frankly, they’re as much a menace as the Islamists. Sometimes, I wonder who writes the speeches of all these Israeli politicians, and their defenders. One thing is for sure: they’re not very good at writing, and about as convincing as a kid claiming he didn’t eat any chocolate with his hands smudged with dark brown traces.

The tales these people are trying to spin are so unbelievable, so badly woven that I could almost feel some compassion toward them. Almost. But behind their pathetic words of justification, of being the shields of the West, innocents die.

The other day, I read a paper where the author was explaining that in his view, Israel doesn’t give a damn about Lebanon, and is just using it as a battleground without the slightest regard for that small state and its population. When I analyze the very thorough destruction of the country’s infrastructure, the raids against food convoys, against humanitarian convoys, the strikes against hospitals and ambulances, the cutting of the last escape routes… Well, I can only come to one conclusion:

Israel cares about Lebanon, all right.

It cares that it is a thorn in its side, and that it needs to be taken out. What I see is the deliberate destruction of that small country. And maybe even something uglier, that I don’t want to contemplate. I can only hope that Lebanon will not become another Bosnia.

I can only hope, while Condi is playing tea and chit-chat, oh, and shedding a tear on the tragedy the poor population of Lebanon is going through—when the cameras are nearby, of course. Wouldn’t want to abuse of her eye-dropper. These things are so expensive, you know!

War Crimes Send Birds Scattering

Didn't you know that? Well, now you do.

On the morning of the carnage^H^H^H^H^H^H^H sad and tragic collateral damage that slaughtered dozens of people among whom a majority of children, the world saw it happening. In a great harmony, the chirping birds just took off in a great and chaotic flutter of wings: dear Mrs Rice and her team made haste to announce they were returning to the US and also pushed to get the one thing they needed: an annoucement that could be seen as going in the direction of a cease-fire. Thus, while the Israeli military used the one worn out excuse that all war criminals have held out over the ages and claimed that the people who died had been warned and only needed to flee, Mrs Rice went into secluded meetings and spent all her energy and influence in reaching the one goal that matters to the Bush Administration: something to soften and help the catastrophic image it has all around the world.

So here came Mrs Rice, the triumphant victor in air-conditioned rooms where people are nice and polite and ask you if you'd like another soda or perhaps a sandwich--much different from the oven-like temperatures, lack of air and constant explosions that send your heart hammering in your chest when you sweat off your nights in a bomb shelter in Lebanon, but still very very hard I'm sure. And here she announced a pause in the air strikes that is scheduled to last some 48 hours. Of course, this concerns air strikes, not ground or naval strikes, and doesn't concern any ground operation currently underway. Of course, the fact that this could very well be just the expression of a tactical modification in Tsahal's plans and not something even remotely resembling a beginning of cease-fire is of no consequence. What matters is that Mrs Rice has her announcement for the world to hear. Something that says "hey, I'm really trying to make it stop, despite what you all think that I'm just biding time and dallying around, delaying the inetrnational community so that Israel can carry out its little war without interfence and do our job for us".

Perhaps she believes it will fool people, and change public opinions around the world as to what the US is really doing in this crisis. If I were her, I wouldn't count on that, though.

As to our nice war criminals and their ages-old excuse of "we warned them, they just needed to flee", I really wish that those people had guts, and just the tiniest bit of courage. I thought that killing off kids and innocent people was the hard part, but it would seem I was mistaken. Slaughtering the innocent is the easy part. Assuming the consequences of your action really seems beyond the strength and courage of Tsahal.

"They were warned," you tell us, Mr Army spokesman. Yes, of course they were. And what were they supposed to do about the warning? "They merely needed to go away," you answer us. Just how were they supposed to do that, Mr Army spokesman? With what means of transportations? On what roads? Over what bridges? Ah, those you all destroyed, thus making travel extremely hazardous and dangerous, if not outright impossible? And I suppose you wouldn't have bombed them on the way either, the way you didn't bomb ambulances and humanitarian or food convoys. Sure. Let's even admit all this, flee where? To what house? What job? What life?

Can you answer me that, Mr Army spokesman?

Ah, no, I see that you can't.

Israel and the US make a ratrher pathetic couple, right now. A pitiful, miserable pair, glued, stuck in a swamp of their own making. Condi must be really put out at Tsahal right now. With its action on Qana, the same Qana which Tsahal bombed back in 1996, slaughtering more than a hundred innocent civilians who had taken refuge in a UNO building (rings a bell?) during a campaign to destroy Hezbollah (rings another bell?). Yes, her feathers must be ruffled at this catastophe--oh, not the losses of innocent lives, no, but on the effect it has in the world, and the consequences for her and the US. It becomes really difficult to hold their "let Israel do what it has to do first" line, but they're doing it. While they go in long meetings to get an annoucement like a pause in air-strikes which is most likely nothing other than a tactical redeployment, our darling Condi is still not calling for an immediate cease-fire. But she does move around, a lot.

And so, as they did in 1996, war crimes send birds scattering in disarray. This time the birds are Condi and her team.

(Source: today's edition of the New York Times)

Oh, last minute news from The Guardian and Le Monde: despite announcing a cease-fire, Israeli jets are busy bombing South Lebanon. But then, what else can one expect from war criminals?

Please, everyone, take note: while the army announced a pause in air strikes to allow refugees to flee, thus implicitly acknowledging that it would have been impossible before and invalidating the ludicrous excuse they used to justify yesterday's carnage, they also announced that that would continue bombing any Hezbollah group detected in action. Black and white in the same sentence. But of course. I'm sure the refugees find this rhetoric very amusing, and appreciate it for what it is.

And while fools like Mr Mallaby vent their frustration by spitting on old Europe, History, as old Europe warned you, is busy repeating itself.

Delusions

In the grand Stratego game unfolding in the Middle East (and killing off hundreds of innocent people, displacing half a million innocents who've lost everything they had to define their lives, but let's not tarry on inconsequential collateral damages, our air strikes have a perfect surgical precision), I have found myself wondering what the heck Tony Blair was doing.

For a very long time, I've found myself wondering just where the UK was going, and how its governement could believe the path it had chosen would be beneficial. When I saw Tony Blair rallying W's insane cause and speech of "Crusades" and "Changing the Middle-East" through the folly that led the US in Irak, I just went, "duh, has Blair taken leave of his senses?"

Well, he has not--or not in the sense I first thought.

Reading today's edition of the Guardian, I have found a few scraps that may be the start of an explanation to Tony Blair's apparently crazy choices and decisions. Why did Tony Blair play along with the brutish, coarse and beyond stupid, primitive rethoric of Georges W Bush? Why did he play along with "Crusades" and "Bring Them On" (W has since then been on the receiving end of his "bring them on", not that he'll ever admit as much)? Why is Blair allowing himself to be seen as the US's dog? Why does he let W talk to him as one would a pal during a student party? Why does he bow at anything W says and play good and obedient "aye aye sir" underling?

Well, it would appear Tony Blair believes he can accomplish something by being on the good side of W. It would appear our dear Tony believes he has a mission to accomplish, and that in order to reach the higher goal, he needs to kind of sacrifice his image by doing a bit of "W boot licking".

There is something that is almost coherent in that line of thinking. It's true that you need to US if you're going to do any good in the Middle-East. You need its military power (although how much of it is left now that they're firmly trapped in Irak and not anywhere near winning free of that swamp?), you need its influence on some Arab countries, and first and ofremost on Israel (if one can conceive that the US will ever go against Israel's will, that is yet to be proven possible). It may also be true that in order to make friends with the US, while it's being led by the likes of W and his goons, Cheney and Rumsfeld overshadowing his every action, you need to play dog and win that friendship through displays of blind, mindless loyalty and all that jazz.

Still, when I contemplate plans like that, when I contemplate Tony Blair playing along with primitive speeches and black and white views of the world, I can't help but ask: Mr Blair, are you simple-minded, naive or blinded by your sense of being burdened by a mission only you can achieve?

You can play W's game all you want, you won't make him change his mind. You won't bring him to your line of thinking. You won't make him see the other side of the coin. W's game is a game of alpha males locked in a sandbox and battling it out. In this game, brains and strategy, intelligence matter almost not at all. You allow yourself to be used, you allow the UK's image in the Arab World (and elsewhere) to be diminished and tainted. But you will get nothing in return.

Trying to counter that by naive displays of your opposition to W in domains like stem cell research that, in the grand scheme of things in the Middle East have zero importance, is nice and all, but will produce no result--or it might, but the opposite of what is desired. Instead of portraying Blair as a courageous opponent to what is nothing more than the obsucrantist policy of a man who's the puppet of raving religious fanatics (yes, I do believe that the Bible Belt people in the US are as dangerous, if not more, than the Islam fundamentalists), this kind of action simply leave off the sensation of a pathetic attempt at showing one's independance from W.

All in all, I always come back to the same conclusion: people who have "missions" are dangerous people. People with missions quickly become blind to anything other than what they perceive to be the one and only path they can walk. People with missions are easily manipulated, and lured the way one wants.

Delusions--it's the worst flaw in people with missions.

And it's a fatal one.

The only way out is to take off one's blindfold and to stop this blind forward race. to accept the possibility of being mistaken, of failure, and to stop. To stop and get a good look around, and change things while there is still time. But doing this takes courage, a lot of it. And Mr Blair doesn't look like he's ready for a much needed bit of soul searching and truth confronting.

In the meantime, Israeli bombs kill hundreds of innocents. Disturbing wounds and burns seem to indicate the possibility of use by Israel of Phosphoric bombs and maybe even chemical weapons. The Hezbollah sends missiles on Israeli cities and kills innocent Israeli civilians. And chaos--grows.

Entropy thrives.

Sometimes I wonder, are human mistakes and blindness just another expression of the second law of Thermodynamics?

Lady demo, Host demo—Kamawanai yo !

Lady or Host, it doesn’t matter !

And truly, it doesn’t. Weirdly enough, I really enjoy this JPOP opening to Ouran Koukou Host Club, a manga being now turned into an anime TV series by the studio Bones. By the horribly high temperatures of this month of July, the show is a very welcome, refreshing breeze of air.

Take all the cliches of the shoujo genre, push them beyond what you thought imaginable. Next, mix the whole lot, and add a good dose of second degree humor, and you get a delightful story which blissfully ridicules all the genre cliches, makes you laugh and put you in a good mood after a hard day of sweating and generally being miserable at work. Of course, the fact Bisco Hatori draws more than pleasant to look at male characters, and th at the character designers have managed to caputre that quality helps in making the show very much enjoyable.

After all, even though the show ridicules the shoujo cliches and the fangirls in the process, it still needs to cater to them so it will sell. And it does the job beautifully. This fangirl is finding herself hooked on it, and needing more—more !

It has everything : Kyouya, the cold, cruel, intelligent and dark planner. Tamaki the gorgeous, naive and unlucky narcissist. Takashi, the silent, taciturn man who will suddenly fling himself to the rescue of cute, small and apparently so vulnerable-looking Hani. Hani himself, the eldest of them all who looks like a child, acts like one and is so cute and sweet it gives you an overdose in around ten seconds (watch out for his bunny rabbit plush., it’s a weapon of mass destruction). And, last but not least : Hikaru and Kaoru, the twins who’ve never had any friends and anyone outside of each other, and get many a squeal of delight each time they play the « Forbidden Gay Love of the Twins » act for the crowds of drooling fangirls attending the Host Club (and paying good money to have the privilege of watching the performances of the hosts).

Of course, in the middle of this very, very nice group of yummy young men comes an intruder : Haruhi. First mistaken for a boy (she really doesn’t care about her appearance or her gender), she stumbles in the middle of the Host Club and gets shangaied into being a member of it.

From thereon, many funny things follow, and classical yet sweet things too : from the daily extravaganza of the Host Club to please their fangirl-customers, to the invasion of a would-be manager for the club who’s a last-degree female otaku drooling over her fantasy of Kyouya and also to the discovery of the twins that Haruhi can tell them apart and sees each of them as an individual, as well as her slow, gentle entry in their private world, Ouran Koukou Host Club is really a delightful surprise, highly recommended during these difficult days of extreme heat and hard work days.

Now, give me MORE !

PS : check out Wikipedia for more info on the show.

When My Pen Itches

It's a very weird sensation. Every now and then, I go through a bout of this strangest of fits.

I want to write. Just to write. Anything. A blog entry, a chapter of a fanfic, a message on a webboard. Anything, so long as I get to write. It's a nagging sensation, but a fun one also. To control it requires a strength of will I sometimes don't feel like gathering. It comes with being lazy, and with this being the end of a sunday afternoon. The sun is gently shining upon the trees on the forest. The heat is at last bearable after the visit of two thunderstorms last night--and most of all, I'm just too tired to shoo this mood away.

But there is one problem: even though I have a fanfic in the works, and scheduled for completion in September, today is July 23rd, and September is still far away. Even though the characters keep pestering me with little details, with insight on their personalities, I just can't let them overcome me for quite a while.

So instead, I write blog entries.

Most of the time, they're somber pieces, because the world we live in is a dark place for a great many, with the notable exception of the West, Japan and some rich people who enjoy life by crushing the existence of others. Nice leeches, very nice. Ooops, I'd better stop here, or this is going to derail in yet another piece of ranting. Sorry about that. So, most of the time I write dark-toned entries, because they reflect my vision of the world, and because I feel the need to share it around (Who ever said I was a nice girl?). I never (well, almost) speak about personal stuff or about my everyday life. Quite frankly, my everyday life is of no interest to strangers, and is better shared with friends and family face to face. Live, you know?

Still, there are brighter things one can talk about in a blog entry. I should talk about anime and manga more than I've done until now. Hm. Yes, I should. I should also talk more about TV series. It would be fitting, since I've immersed myself in those in the last months, more than I've watched anime.

Perhaps I should also warn the innocent reader who'd somehow stumble upon this blog entry to beware of Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (aka MMORPG). Even I, who never play Computer Games (and I mean that, I don't even own a single one, and I own no console), got swallowed by that abyss. For a few months, I sank into a universe, devoting more and more time to that game each day, allowing it to eat bigger and bigger bits of my life. Welll, no longer. I have other things to do, other interests, and another universe to exist into, thank you very much.

But the lure of those online universes is a powerful one. Before I was confronted to such an experience, I didn't quite understand how you could get devoured by those things. Now, I have a better idea of the process involved. But I also know that you can easily win free of them. In those games as in all things, you decide. You, and nobody else. You decide to earse a character you created to be an ersatz of you. Nobody can prevent you from doing that, but yourself. Consequences on the universe you're leaving? Hey, why do you care? Leave it to the other players, they'll manage. Why worry? That universe existed before you came along, and it will keep on existing long after you're gone. We like to believe it, and to entertain that illusion, but we're not indispensable. In any domain, anywhere.

As they say, cemetaries are filled with indispensable people.

.... Hmmmmmm--we're now rather far away from the subject of my wirting brighter blog entries. Not to mention the title of this particular entry. Although, come to think of it, all this rambling has one source: my pen is itching.

Right now, I feel like writing.

Anything.

Just...writing.

And it feels wonderful!

And All Their Dreams, Torn Asunder.

I’ve been trying to gather my thoughts on the current wars led by Israel against the civilians of Gaza and Lebanon. I know, I know, many righteous people will tell me that Israel is simply trying to free its kidnapped soldiers and fighting against the terrorists of Hamas and Hezbollah. Will those same people please explain to me how bombing the Christian quarters of Beirut is fighting the Hezbollah? How annihilating the infrastructures of Lebanon, undermining its government and killing off children is fighting against terror and helping free those poor soldiers?

It’s highly likely, all these actions can achieve is getting those soldiers killed, sparking rage and long-lived hatred in the hearts of the Lebanese population, and in the end destroying any hope for peace and stability in the region for a very, very long time.

No matter how I try, I just don’t understand the rationale that’s behind Israel’s current actions. I don’t understand what the government of Ehoud Olmert is hoping to achieve. Destroying the Hezbollah? Can anyone in his right mind truly believe that? After a week of intense bombardment, all Israel has achieved is the destruction of a country that was rebuilding itself and finally succeeding in getting a chance at peace and stability after a score of years in the throes of civil war and Israeli/Syrian occupation. The death toll in civilians has soared, while the Hezbollah appears to have lost almost nothing of its power and hold on the South of Lebanon. With its seemingly random strikes, Israel is seen attacking humanitarian convoys, Beirut’s reserves for food, and it’s even hampering the evacuation of foreigners by threatening the boats which come to Beirut to get innocent people trapped in this one)sided war.

Yes, you heard me. I’m sure the American press hasn’t spoken much of it, but Israel has forced French evacuation boats to leave early, abandoning hundreds of refugees in Beirut, because past a given time Israel kindly warned the French authorities that it could “no longer guarantee” the boats’ safety and safe escape from the trap of Beirut’s port.

There. Now, do you see where we stand? Do you see the insanity of Israel’s actions? I get the feeling this is a runaway train heading straight for a mountain’s wall at full speed, and unable to stop.

What will it take for the international community to react?

Mr Bush is happy to let Israel do what he’d do if he could spare the military power, since his primitive black and white vision of the world would have him subdue the parts of the world which don’t work according to his views through the force of arms. Mr Bush dares to “hope the civilian casualties will be kept to the minimum”, in yet another display of despicable hypocrisy. Mr Bush cares nothing if Lebanon is destroyed. Mr Bush imagines that he can have Israel be the US’s viceroy in the region, a looming, threatening power that would guarantee the region’s stability for the US’ insatiable thirst for oil (and its profit for W’s friends…). And if whole populations in the Middle East are unhappy, live in poverty, cannot have the slightest chance at achieving a good life, who cares? Not Mr Bush, and not the Christian fanatics which are his base of support.

Mr Blair is also happy being Mr Bush’s dog. For some reason I have yet to understand, Mr Blair has chosen to debase the UK, and to play the role of Mr Bush’s and the US’ faithful servant. The G8 meeting conversation (in its entirety, not the small bit that went on TV), is very enlightening in that regard. There, again, I fail to understand. And I fail to understand how the English people can accept that, and how the advisers who have the ear of Mr Blair let him play that game without warning him of the political consequences of this game of his. He should stop, if only for his own personal interest—or is he really into that foaming at the mouth self-righteous “world vision” that they’re brining peace by allowing a few “unfortunate sacrifices” to take place?

As to Europe…. Poor, tattered Europe. The acceptance of the Eastern countries has diminished it. We have welcomed among us people who care nothing for the European ideal, only for the money Europe can bestow upon their private companies. Politically-wise, they follow the US in blind displays of gratitude for the US’s so-called support during the cold war, even though as I recall, at Yalta, when Stalin cut the world in half, the Americans agreed to it, and to abandoning the Eastern countries behind the Iron Curtain to the tender mercies of the Soviet Empire. Needless to say, I have yet to understand those people’s blind faith in the US as well.

France would do the right thing, France is calling for action and a cease-fire. At least someone is. But they don’t have the military power to move, and make a difference. Europe is too divided for France’s voice to be heard, thanks to all our new friends from the East.

The silence of the Arab countries is deafening, and extremely dangerous. The more time passes, the more populations who see that Lebanon is abandoned to the bombs of Israel are likely to turn, not to their own governments, but to terrorist groups and militia.

Where are Israel’s and the US’s hopes for a future stability and peace in the region in all this?

Nowhere.

The only thing in sight is-- War.

Devastation.

Death.

Injustice.

Horror rained down from the sky by people who should know better, whose families have suffered the most horrible of genocides, and thus should know better than to visit chaos and death on innocents. Or is it that the horrors they suffered has bereft them of a heart and soul? Is it that they believe themselves entitled to any kind of action because of their terrible past? Has it made them blind and uncaring to the suffering of others? There is a horrible symmetry in Israel’s actions, in its bombing of innocent people. I think, that many people who advocate this exercise in slaughter of a country should take a good look in the mirror. I think what they’d see there wouldn’t be to their liking.

Because, the more time passes, the more they are becoming the enemy.

And all those who give a sad nod and look the other way as Mr Bush and Mr Blair are doing, are following the same dark path.

Tell me, Mr Bush, tell me, Mr Blair, you who think so highly of yourselves and your motives, where is your moral high ground, when you allow the bombing of humanitarian convoys, of purely civilian targets, of Christian quarters of Beirut to take place? Where is it, when you admittedly plan to wait until the grisly job of butchering Lebanon is done before coming in as saviours?

In Lebanon, people had at last reached the end s of their struggles. They had overcome the terrible consequences of a twenty-years long civil war. They had rebuilt. They were looking at very good prospects in terms of tourism. People at last had a chance of building themselves good lives, and at being happy.

All this is gone.

All this has been annihilated by Israel, and by the US’s and the UK’s mad choice to let it all happen unhindered.

All those people’s dreams, burnt to ashes.

All Dead Civilans, Rise--and Say Thank You!

Every time I think we've hit rock bottom in ugliness and manipulation, a nice piece of news slaps me in the face to remind me that, no, there is no bottom to this particular pit of mud.

The US has reached an agreement with Israel on how to manage the little skirmishes taking place in Lebanon. Yeah, you know, this little bit of strife, where Israel is just trying to free two soldiers and accidentally killing off scores of civilians, men, women, children and old people (those are just collateral damages, they're sorry about them):

The outlines of an American-Israeli consensus began to emerge on Tuesday in which Israel would continue to bombard Lebanon for about another week to degrade the capabilities of the Hezbollah militia, officials of the two countries said.

Then, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would go to the region and seek to establish a buffer zone in southern Lebanon and perhaps an international force to monitor Lebanon’s borders to prevent Hezbollah from obtaining more rockets with which to bombard Israel.

American officials signaled that Ms. Rice was waiting at least a few more days before wading into the conflict, in part to give Israel more time to weaken Hezbollah forces.

Now I wonder, just how callous, how cynical can the US be? Wait until Israel has had time to weaken the Hezbollah, sure. And to kill how many more innocent people in the meantime? To destroy how many more roads, bridges, electric plants? Waiting until Israel has had time to weaken the Hezbollah? Talk about waiting until Israel is done anihilating that poor country, and blowing any hope of peace in the region to smithereens!

Mrs Rice, when you travel there to be seen as the American hero, the peace keeper, please, don't forget to drop by the destroyed homes and crops, by the cemetaries to chat with those who have lost a son, a daughter, a sister, a brother, a mother, a father, a friend to this barbaric war led by Israel. I'm sure they'll understand your rationale, and will congratulate you without any reservation.

Heck, maybe you and your dear W will be up for the Nobel Prize for peace next year, who knows?

... Oh, sorry, my mistake, I meant the Nobel Prize for Chaos Spawning and Cynicism. What? There's no such thing? No worries, I'm sure we can come with something suitable in no time.

(Source today's New York Times)

Laugh So That You Won't Cry

Reading the media everyday, and in particular reading the Editorial and Opinion columns is the only way to get the beginnings of a grasp of situations, and what people think about it (I really hate this in American media, they never speak their mind and their news columns are blunt descriptions without a single hint of opinion voicing, which allows the readers who skip the opinions section to escape the facts that one should reflect and analyze events, make oneself an opinion on those).

It is also, sometimes, a good way to get a good laugh at the idiots who look down on Europe and are blind to their own (perfect by nature and definition) country. Yesterday's editorial of the Washington Post by Mr Mallaby was such a welcome occasion to laugh at an otherwise more than dreary world situation. Here is the great wisdom Mr Mallaby has to share with us retarded peoples of Europe:

We may need $100 oil to jolt the Europeans and the Chinese.

Yeah, sure. It will jolt us. But first, darling, it will jolt YOU. We're not the ones living in coutnries where masculinity is defined by the number of gallons your car swallows every 100 kms. You do. Our cars drink a meager 5 litres per km. Your cars drink, on average, at least 3 times that. We have correct means of collective transport like trains. You have a decaying train system, and you have planes (very hungry where kerosene is concerned as I recall). So, while we will certainly get a jolt, it will most likely happen some time after the US has started weeping and wishing it had better ways of expressing its (obvious) superiority over all of humankind.


Even today, many of these freeloaders see mayhem in Iraq as America's problem. You'd think that chaos in a major oil exporter, with the potential to seed extremism all over the Middle East, would alarm all responsible governments.

Two sentences, two comments:
1 - But it is your problem, my dear. You decided to go there under the false pretense of bringing democracy to the Middle-East. You got warned you would only spawn chaos and instability and make the situation worse than it was at the start, but you went in anyway with your guns blazing. We even went so far as to tell you in the great hall of UNO before the whole world, and to veto your use of NATO for your own purposes. You went in anyway. Now you realize we were right all along. Well, shoulder your responsibility and deal, darling.
2 - But we are alarmed, my dear. We are alarmed. We told you so. The thing is, it's still your shit, your mess, your chaos. You went in and did it, now clean up after yourselves, why don't you? We are aware that oil is a much bigger problem for you than it is for us. Don't ask us to settle what you created against our expressed will and advice.

There is more where that comes from, among what is, in part, a rather interesting paper on Israel's response in Lebanon. If I have one piece of advice for Mr Mallaby it's this one: learn to accept blame, learn to accept you can fail and make mistakes. Drop the arrogance, and maybe people will be more prone to listen to you and to help you out. Right now, you're not winning at the world's great popularity contest.

Back into the Stone Age

An eye for an eye. Of course, that's written in the Scriptures, but then many things (and their exact opposite, but let's not be picky here) are written in the Scriptures--most of which are absurdities, barbaric monstrosities and displays of blind rage, hatred and people foaming at the mouth with an insatiable lust for vengeance.

Still, in today's Israel, Gaza and Lebanon, we've upped the scales and gone beyond a mere eye for an eye. When one of the greatest military powers in the world uses the pretext of an attack by a milita to bomb a civilian airport, bomb civilian targets and blockade a sovereign country, we have indeed crossed a line. Mr Bush can say that Israel has the right to defend itself, that is as obvious as the sun's rising in the East every morning at dawn. However, defending oneself doesn't mean bombing people back into the stone age--not in my book. The more so, since this particular militia, the Hezbollah, was born thanks to one of Israel's many tragic mistakes of the past. To condemn and strike a country and its population because your own mistakes are coming back to haunt you is...I don't know, it's hard to find a word to describe that--convenient? Hypocritical? Revolting?

I keep hearing the Israeli ambassador in Brussels claiming that Israel has exercised a lot of restraint, and that Israel is being more than reasonable. I fear, his definition of the word "reasonable" is starting to differ so much from mine, and from many people's in Europe, that soon nothing will be able to bridge that gap in mutual comprehension. And there lies a terrible threat to much more than just Israel. The more chaos spreads in the Middle-East, the more likely it becomes that someday, someone will snap and push on a button. And the less we are able to talk with people on both sides, the less the words we use when we talk to each other have the same meaning to all around the table, the greater the risk of someone pushing that button someday will be.

Even if you don't give a damn about civilian populations in Lebanon or Gaza, even if you hate their guts, even if you couldn't care less about their right to self-determination and to their own country, even if you laugh at the concept of justice or of the UNO's resolutions, there's one thing you should care about: what will happen if things keep deteriorating. For many reasons, Israel believes it is above all criticism, and is entitled to act however it pleases in what it perceives to be the defense of its territory or interests. I understand those reasons, but they are not reasons. They are historical facts, historical tragedies, but they are not reasons. They do not place Israel above and beyond reckoning, or beyond the rule of international law.

Still, I find myself hard placed to blame Israel for their continuing use of the same "you can't tell us what to do because we're the victims here" response. Why should they stop? It works. Nobody really dares to go against that line. Nobody really dares to tell them to stop with the victimization trip, and to get real. Certainly not the US, which would do better to have a good reality check and get a good look at a map of the world, and not our poor unbalanced and dangling Europe. And in the meantime, civilians get bombed, people die.

Rage festers.

Hatred grows.

Israel is not more secure than it was before. The Israelian people are no happier. They still dread suicide-bombers when they take a bus or sit down in a cafe or a restaurant.

To break the cycle is the only viable solution--that, or complete anihilation of the enemy. I regret to say that I am not in favor of the latter. And breaking the cycle is hard, extremely difficult. It demands courage and guts. Grand warlike speeches--those do not demand any kind of courage, they just demand spit, a good pitch and a high dose of populism.

So, now what?

Will Israel push the Middle East the rest of the way down the path to Chaos?

If this were a novel, it might be interesting, or thrilling to find out. It's not fiction, it's reality. I am not thrilled. I am disgusted, and somehwere, deep, deep down, I hope someone will at last see the only way out of this, and will have the strength to try.

Give Us A Break

There are many grave things happening in the world. Terror has struck India, the US at last declares its will to abide by the Geneva Conventions (bye bye, torture) while hypocritically trying to cover up for its actions during these last years (the Pentagon claimed its policies always generally complied with the Geneva Conventions--and mock drownings or other niceties are part of all good youth Summer camps as we all know), and yet the media remain hopelessly stuck on a football(*) match.

On a few seconds of a match, to be exact. Come on, people, yes, Zidane struck Materazzi. Yes, Zidane deserved the Red Card. No, there is no excuse for a great professional player such as he, used to all these insults that are the everyday life of a pro during matches, to react that way, no matter what Materazzi said, be it about his mother, his sister, his cat if he has one, or anything.

There.

Done.

Now, get over it, and get a life!

Not only are the media beyond ridiculous in their obsessive quest for the words that triggered Zidane's anger--it does NOT matter, people, it is DONE. You will NOT have this match replayed--but what's more now the low-lives that are the Far Right people, in France and in Italy, are now joining the fray. The stench of racism is now appearing in newspapers, be it because they are the tool of the Far Right, or because they relay what they have the gall to call "information" in order to get more audience.

I am starting to think there is no limit to the mediocrity of the Far Right. I hope this blow right back in its face. I also hope the general media will at last give up on this hysteria, and finally realize that the World Cup is OVER.

The world keeps on turning.

Wars keep happening. People keep dying. Iraq is still there. Israel is bombing Gaza back into the stone age with the most ludicrous of pretexts, global warming is coming along way faster than first estimated...

Yeah, I think there are other things to consider right now.

Just a bit more important than a stupid head blow.

(*) Oh, not the American thing that is armored-rugby, football, you know, the game that's played with feet, hence the sport's name...

Long Live McCarthyism!

Those who thought that the superb movie Good Night, and Good Luck by George Clooney is just retelling tales of a past buried in the black depths of US history are sadly mistaken.

Mc Carthyism is still alive, and in better shape than ever!

What? The fabled US Freedom of Speech?

Oh, you mean the concept that allows fascists, neo-nazis and equally pleasant gentlemen to widely express their views, demonstrate in the streets and spit their hatred in the face of citizens cowed by fear?

Well, that wonderful concept is reserved for a certain class of people: the far-right extremists, the wackos, the religious fundamentalists who'd have anyone bow low before their idea of a divine entity.

As to the left-wingers, the liberals, the critics of W's long list of ineptitudes and mistakes, well, those cannot benefit from that oh so generous and advanced concept.

They are branded as traitors, as madmen. They are compared to Hitler, and great top-class (and right-wing) national papers take care to help in the unmasking and denouciation of those dangerous outcasts of the self-righteous American Society. This is what a professor of the presitigous university of Yale found out, at his expense. And of course, he's not the only one to have known the sorry fate of the outcast rejected by all, by friends, colleagues and students alike. His crime? Well, to harbor views that do not run with the mainstream of the Wall Street Journal's news, or with those of the so delicately balanced Fox News.

Anyuone interested can find the whole story here, in this paper of the Guardian's today edition.

A week or two ago, I was reading a paper reporting the words of former Justice Sandra O'Connor, recently retired from the US Supreme Court. In her speech before a floor of corporate lawyers, she was warning them against the threatening changes in the US governance, against what she called the US's current edging toward a dictatorship.

Well, it would seem the US is still edging in that direction. As things stand, the polarization of the opinion within the US, the years of pushing forward all the fundamentalists and extremists, be they religious or neo-cons, has transformed the US. Before the Bush years, the US used to be an image feared or hated in some parts of the world.

It is now a threatening, looming figure for many of its own citizens as well.