Ghostdog

I went to see the wrestler. Mickey Rourke, who has always been one of my favorite actors, put in a truly remarkable performance as the Ram. A used up piece of meat who deserves to be alone but somehow makes a comeback in the ring. Marisa Tomei, also put in an extraordinary performance as a stripper who has seen her better days. Torme displays a lot of guts and skin in her portrayal of the stripper. It’s her pole work I admire. Asbury Park makes an appearance in the scene by the sea as another metaphor for the down and out that has had its glory days in a bygone era but is making a comeback of its own. And the title song, “The Wrestler” by Bruce Springsteen who we know hails from Asbury Park is the icing on the cake. There is much to recommend in The Wrestler. Go see it. You won’t be sorry.   

The Gaza Strip is rapidly becoming one of the worst humanitarian disasters in the world. Israel has cordoned off the entire area, home to some 1.4 million Palestinians, blocking commercial goods, food, fuel and even humanitarian aid. At least 36 people have been killed in Israeli strikes since Tuesday and many more wounded. Hamas, which took control of Gaza in June, has launched about 200 rockets into southern Israel in the same period in retaliation, injuring more than 10 people. Israel announced the draconian closure and collective punishment Thursday in order to halt the rocket attacks, begun on Tuesday, when 18 Palestinians, including the son of a Hamas leader, were killed by Israeli forces.

This is not another typical spat between Israelis and Palestinians. This is the final, collective strangulation of the Palestinians in Gaza. The decision to block shipments of food by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency means that two-thirds of the Palestinians who rely on relief aid will no longer be able to eat when U.N. stockpiles in Gaza run out. Reports from inside Gaza speak of gasoline stations out of fuel, hospitals that lack basic medicine and a shortage of clean water. Whole neighborhoods were plunged into darkness when Israel cut off its supply of fuel to Gaza's only power plant. The level of malnutrition in Gaza is now equal to that in the poorest sub-Saharan nations.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert uses words like war to describe the fight to subdue and control Gaza. But it is not war. The Palestinians have little more than old pipes fashioned into primitive rocket launchers, AK-47s and human bombs with which to counter the assault by one of the best-equipped militaries in the world. Palestinian resistance is largely symbolic. The rocket attacks are paltry, especially when pitted against Israeli jet fighters, attack helicopters, unmanned drones and the mechanized units that make regular incursions into Gaza. A total of 12 Israelis have been killed over the past six years in rocket attacks. Suicide bombings, which once rocked Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, have diminished, and the last one inside Israel that was claimed by Hamas took place in 2005. Since the current uprising began in September 2000, 1,033 Israelis and 4,437 Palestinians have died in the violence, according to the Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem. B'Tselem noted in a December 2007 report that the dead included 119 Israeli children and 971 Palestinian children.

The failure on the part of Israel to grasp that this kind of brutal force is deeply counterproductive is perhaps understandable given the demonization of Arabs, and especially Palestinians, in Israeli society. The failure of Washington to intervene -- especially after President Bush's hollow words about peace days before the new fighting began -- is baffling. Collective abuse is the most potent recruiting tool in the hands of radicals, as we saw after the indiscriminate Israeli bombing of Lebanon and the American occupation of Iraq. The death of innocents and collective humiliation are used to justify callous acts of indiscriminate violence and revenge. It is how our own radicals, in the wake of 9/11, lured us into the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Israel has been attempting to isolate and punish Gaza since June when Hamas took control after days of street fighting against its political rival Fatah. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, a Fatah leader, dissolved the unity government. His party, ousted from Gaza, has been displaced to the Israeli-controlled West Bank. The isolation of Hamas has been accompanied by a delicate dance between Israel and Fatah. Israel hopes to turn Fatah into a Vichy-style government to administer the Palestinian territories on its behalf, a move that has sapped support for Fatah among Palestinians and across the Arab world. Hamas' stature rises with each act of resistance.

I knew the Hamas leader Dr. Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, who was assassinated by Israel in April of 2004. Rantissi took over Hamas after its founder, Sheik Ahmed Yassin, was assassinated by the Israelis in March of that year. Rantissi was born in what is now Israel and driven from his home in 1948 during the war that established the Jewish state. He, along with more than 700,000 other Palestinian refugees, grew up in squalid camps. As a small boy he watched the Israeli army enter and occupy the camp of Khan Younis in 1956 when Israel invaded Gaza. The Israeli soldiers lined up dozens of men and boys, including some of Rantissi's relatives, and executed them. The memory of the executions marked his life. It fed his lifelong refusal to trust Israel and stoked the rage and collective humiliation that drove him into the arms of the Muslim Brotherhood and later Hamas. He was not alone. Several of those who founded the most militant Palestinian organizations witnessed the executions in Gaza carried out by Israel in 1956 that left hundreds dead. 

Rantissi was a militant. But he was also brilliant. He studied pediatric medicine and genetics at Egypt's Alexandria University and graduated first in his class. He was articulate and well read and never used in my presence the crude, racist taunts attributed to him by his Israeli enemies. He reminded me that Hamas did not target Israeli civilians until Feb. 25, 1994, when Dr. Baruch Goldstein, dressed in his Israeli army uniform, entered a room in the Cave of the Patriarchs, which served as a mosque, and opened fire on Palestinian worshipers.  Goldstein killed 29 unarmed people and wounded 150. Goldstein was rushed by the survivors and beaten to death.

"When Israel stops killing Palestinian civilians we will stop killing Israeli civilians," he told me. "Look at the numbers. It is we who suffer most. But it is only by striking back, by making Israel feel what we feel, that we will have any hope of protecting our people."

The drive to remove Hamas from power will not be accomplished by force. Force and collective punishment create more Rantissis. They create more outrage, more generations of embittered young men and women who will dedicate their lives to avenging the humiliation, perhaps years later, they endured and witnessed as children. The assault on Gaza, far from shortening the clash between the Israelis and Palestinians, ensures that it will continue for generations. If Israel keeps up this attempt to physically subdue Gaza we will see Hamas-directed suicide bombings begin again. This is what resistance groups that do not have tanks, jets, heavy artillery and attack helicopters do when they want to fight back and create maximum terror. Israeli hawks such as Ephraim Halevy (a former head of Mossad), Giora Eiland (who was national security adviser to Ariel Sharon) and Shaul Mofaz (a former defense minister) are all calling for some form of dialogue with Hamas. They get it. But without American pressure Prime Minister Olmert will not bend.

Israel, despite its airstrikes and bloody incursions, has been unable to halt the rocket fire from Gaza or free Cpl. Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier captured in the summer of 2006. Continued collective abuse and starvation will not break Hamas, which was formed, in large part, in response to Israel's misguided policies and mounting repression. There will, in fact, never be Israeli-Palestinian stability or a viable peace accord now without Hamas' agreement. And the refusal of the Bush administration to intercede, to move Israel toward the only solution that can assure mutual stability, is tragic not only for the Palestinians but ultimately Israel.

And so it goes on. The cycle of violence that began decades ago, that turned a young Palestinian refugee with promise and talent into a militant and finally a martyr, is turning small boys today into new versions of what went before them. Olmert, Bush's vaunted partner for peace, has vowed to strike at Palestinian militants "without compromise, without concessions and without mercy," proof that he and the rest of his government have learned nothing. It is also proof that we, as the only country with the power to intervene, have become accessories to murder.

See more stories tagged with: extremism, violence, hamas, bush, israel, gaza

Chris Hedges, a Pulitzer prize-winning reporter, was the Middle East bureau chief for The New York Times. He spent seven years in the Middle East and reported frequently from Iran. His latest book is American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America.

Rita Hayworth

Ava Gardner

Marilyn Monroe

Sophia Loren

Sade

Tony Braxton

J LO

Jenna Jameson

Uma Thurman

Penelope Cruz

Eight Random Facts About Me

1.    The first random fact about me is how painful it is that I find this task to be. It’s not that I am shy it’s that I am painfully shy.

2.    I don’t like to talk about myself.

3.    I used to sell magazines door to door. One time we had a sales contest: First Prize was a new Cadillac. Second prize was a set of steak knives. Third prize was you were fired.

4.    I’ll be 59 years old August 9. I always used to be the youngest guy in the room. Now I am the oldest. The best revenge is to outlive your enemies.

5.    I was born in a Log cabin in Kentucky in a town called Hope.

6.    I am a mammal standing on this sterile promontory with only a hitchhikers’ guide to lead me.

7.    I think that Religion poisons everything and could very well lead to the destruction of the earth and the extinction of mankind.

8.    I can’t bring myself to say, “I guess I’ll be toddling along.” It isn’t that I can’t toddle, it’s that I can’t guess I’ll toddle.

Go see Pans Labrynth. It is a wonderful film. I highly recommend. Check out the link Below.

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/pans_labyrinth/reviews_users.php

Prajna nay be likened to the rain, the moisture of which reflects every living thing.

-Hui-neng

The quality of mercy is not strained, It falleth to the ground like the gentle rain.

-William Shakespeare

Dresden (Germany) was the largest massacre in European history. On 2/13/1945, 135,000 people were killed by British firebombing in one night. The whole city was burned down. It was a British atrocity. Not ours. We firebombed Tokyo and Nuked Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

Darfur, a region in Western Sudan, is home to the first genocide of the 21st century. In February of 2003, government sponsored militias began systematic process of killing, raping and torturing innocent civilians.To date over 400,000 people have died and over 205 million have been displaced from their homes. Currently there are approximately 3.5 million men, women and children in the western Darfur region of Sudan. The Sudanese government has sponsored a campaign of violence and forced starvation.

Not since the Rwandan genocide of 1994 has the world seen such a calculated campaign of displacement, starvation, rape and mass slaughter. These innocent victims are essentially on life support, their continued existence dependent on the U S and international humanitarian aid and the presence of African Union Peacekeepers.

Despite the best efforts of the under funded and under manned African Union peacekeeping force, attacks have increased in recent months, leading to tens of thousands of new arrivals at refugee camps in Darfur and across the border in Chad.

International experts agree that the United Nations Security Council must deploy a peacekeeping force with a mandate to protect Darfur's civilians immediately.

Please visit www.SaveDarfur.org to learn more.

Arrowsmiths

Arrowsmiths make arrows

Bow constructors make bows

Time flies like arrows

Bovines grow bows

A bowman is a male bow

A bowie is a little bow

And boeing is the sound a bow makes

When the string goes boeing. 

The Constitution of the United States of America

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

In a universe suddenly divested of illusions and lights, man feels an alien, a stranger. At any street corner the feeling of absurdity can strike a man in the face.

-Sartre

When the existence of the state is threatened, it is released from the commandments of morality. With unity as the end, the use of every means is sanctified, even cunning, treachery, violence, prison or death. For all order is for the sake of the community and the individual must be sacrificed to the common good.

From the One Percent Doctrine, by Dick Cheney

"You have to choose. Love either lasts or it goes up in flames; the tragedy is that it can't last and go up in flames as well."

- Camus

The Seven Spiritul Laws of Success

Wu wei is non striving. Non purposeful action. Wu wei is hinged on the idea of understanding the natural flow of an environment and not fighting that nature. Moving and bending with a natural flow is an action of what is referred to as a "supple reed." Conversely, trying to combat the natural flow is characteristic of a "rigid tree."

Doing not doing. When nothing is done, nothing is left undone.

Non striving. Principle of living in harmony with nature...

Action-less action. Spontaneous action.

I swore never to be silent, whenever human beings endure suffering or humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encouraged the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant. Whenever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religious or political views, the place must, for the present, become the center of the universe. This is awareness in action.

-Elie Weisel

Islamic Fascism

Donald Rumsfeld suffers from moral and intellectual confusion. He says that by opposing the war protesters are appeasing a new type of fascism. Islamic Fundamentalism is without a doubt a threat to the western world, but it is not fascism. It doesn’t even hold up as a metaphor. There is no state or regime to appease.

Fascism by definition is a totalitarian form of philosophy of government that glorifies the state and assigns to the state control over every aspect of national life. These are distinctions that disqualify the usage of the word “Islamofascism”

Rumsfeld need to go back to school and study his history before he tries to deliver a lesson to the rest of us.

Terrorists should not be ignored, or appeased, but let’s get it right; calling them fascists doesn’t help, it is merely inaccurate. Associating the religion of Islam with fascism is both offensive and inaccurate. Fascism is an expression of extreme right wing politics. Political ideologies derived from fascism have been violently opposed to Islamism.

Fascism is nationalistic and Islam is hostile to nationalism. Fundamentalism is transnational and appeals to believers of all nations and races across national boundaries. There is no idea of racial purity. Fascism in Europe was a secular movement.

The term “Islamofascism” is a term of military propaganda, full of sound and fury, crafted to produce hysteria, destroy all sense of proportion, signifying nothing.

BENN BELL

Philadelphia

2006

Death Speaks:

There was a merchant in Baghdad who sent his servant to the market to buy some supplies. In a little while the servant came back shaken and pale. "Oh, master," he said, "While I was at the market I was pushed and shoved by a woman there in the crowd. When I turned to look I saw it was Death who pushed me. She made a threatening gesture and I was afraid so I ran away. Please lend me your jeep and I will ride away from Baghdad as fast as I can to avoid my fate. I will drive down to Samarra and Death will not find me there."

The merchant lent his servant his Jeep and the servant jumped into the vehicle and swiftly drove away as fast as he could to Samarra. Then the merchant went to the market place in Baghdad and saw me standing there in the crowd. He approached me and said, "Why did you threaten my servant this morning?" "I didn't threaten your servant," I said, "I was just surprised to see him there, that's all. You see, I have an appointment with him tonight in Samarra...."

To realize the nature of mind is to realize the nature of all things.

Saints and mystics throughout history have adorned their realizations with different names and given them different faces and interpretations, but what they are fundamentally experiencing is the essential nature of mind. Christians and Jews call it "God;" Hindus call it the "Self," "Shiva," "Brahman," and "Vishnu;" Sufi mystics name it the "Hidden Essence;" and Buddhists call it "Buddha nature." At the heart of all religions is the certainty that there is a fundamental truth, and that this life is a sacred opportunity to evolve and realize it.

  -Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying

It was a singers song writers weekend in Philadelphia last week.

The City of Brotherly Love.

They held the thing on Penn's Landing, where such events usually occur.

I got there in time to hear Suzanne Vega croon about Luka and hear Bruce

Coburn entertain the crowd.

The day was hot and the sun was bright and the colors dazzled the eye.

There was a gentle breeze blowing in from the Delaware River making the motley

Canvass dance above the stage.

As the afternoon wore on the yellow sun sunk lower and lower until finally

It disappeared behind the city skyline.

The moon was full that night and it raised simultaneous in the East over the

Camden Waterfront.

The temperature dropped a dollop or two until it reached a delightful degree.

The women wore their summer dresses and carried their babies slung on cocked hips.

Their faces were young and fresh and their eyes shone bright as they listened to the music.

It was a singers song writers weekend in the City of Brotherly Love.

Benn Bell

Philadelphia