• 1 Post
  • 27 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: August 4th, 2023

help-circle












  • Nowhere in your first comment do you make anything like the argument in your second comment. You say that my summary is reductive and that I built an “over complicated argument” by talking about broken promises. But then you essentially argue that this will be a broken promise!

    Your second argument is more reasonable, and not at all over complicated, which is why I anticipated it. The problem with your fatalist take is that “mere talk” precedes, not only broken promises, but also fulfilled promises. Honestly, if your cynical take is right, then there’s no reason to expect anything from any party ever. Cynicism is depressingly fashionable on the left.









  • I think 9/11 is a great analogy. The lesson I draw from that period, however, is that we cannot let bloodlust win. Hundreds of thousands dead, $8 trillion spent, for nothing.

    The editor of the Jewish Current makes the same analogy in his article Have We Learned Nothing?

    That America overreacted to 9/11 and compounded the scale of the tragedy is now a standard position among progressives, and even some conservatives; these days it takes little courage to denounce “the forever wars” and to condemn the shortsightedness of liberal intellectuals who aligned themselves with George W. Bush and his neoconservative advisers to champion the invasion of Iraq. But at the time, it was far more common for conscientious progressives to equivocate and prevaricate. To foreground the suffering of the Americans in the Twin Towers was obligatory; to acknowledge the past, present, or future victims of American violence abroad was at best awkward; to imply these things might be related was something almost no one wanted to hear when it might have made any difference.

    Now is not the time to abandon nuance, but neither is it the time to be too “understanding” of Israel’s bloodlust, because their overwhelming advantage in power and resources over Palestinians means an alarming potential for abuse.