So, then, can one agree with the famous quip that Jews are not undeservedly rising to the top… taking the top positions in society because, the belief goes, they are obviously smarter as a group?
Let’s examine this proposition for a minute. We know for a fact that today’s Jews come from two different ethnic groups, historically, biologically, totally unrelated, The Sephardic (which is in itself a mix of some old stock Semitic with Mediterranean blood, from Moorish to Western European); and the Ashkenazi, which are even more remote from any ancient Jews, as being a Turkic race, which at its roots is a branch of the Mongols, and in turn heavily mixed with Eastern European genes.
How could such an utterly heterogeneous population have a high IQ on the basis of its ethnic composition?
Rather, what is the common denominator for all these unrelated subgroups from North Africa through Central Asia is the belief in and the pursuit of a very distinct cultural doctrine, unlike any other group in the world. And that culture of belief in one’s superiority, and believing one is “above the law” of humanity, not bound by moral responsibility to fellow humans – seeing rather a master/slave relationship, whereby non-Jews are simply not real humans and need not be respected or dealt with as one’s brothers and sisters.
Therefore, deceiving and cheating the “other”, colluding against them, undermining them and their culture in any way possible, enslaving them, despoiling them, are all not only permitted but are actively pursued in a concerted community-wide fashion so that the organized Jewish community acts against the unsuspecting other nations, who feel themselves bound by restrictive notions of moral behavior, categorical imperative, individual rights and defense of privacy, the quest for ataraxia, or belief in sacred values.
Imagine a driver at an intersection who, rather than obeying the .. long line at the exit, defies everybody and cuts ahead by driving on the shoulder, sneering at the docile “dopes” sitting in line. Well, it works, as long as everybody else does not break the rules. Otherwise, we can imagine the gridlock, the mayhem, the anarchy, and the collapse of the societal structure.
Under normal rule of law and order, individuals breaking the law are sanctioned, but when it’s done in the name of religious privileges and religious immunity by an organized group, all of a sudden it takes on the appearance of supernatural abilities to come out ahead in any situation. In fact, it is not a proof of high IQ, it is just the outcome of anti-social, criminal behavior.
[. . .] To summarize the general debate: under what circumstances do real world achievements call into question group tests of intellect? One answer is: when more of the group in question have real-life achievements above what would be expected from their measured average intelligence. In my view there should be no doubt that real world achievements are a better measure of intelligence than predictive assessments.
One straightforward approach is to follow a standard procedure. Take the average intelligence score for the nation; then take the best estimate of the nation’s total population; then calculate how many citizens are above a criterion, say Greenwich Mean Intelligence plus two standard deviations (IQ 130) and then compare that number of bright persons with the number of persons who win intellectual prizes.
[. . .] African Americans should have more high-performing outliers than Africans, per head of population. When corrected for population size the pool of talent to be drawn from is 41 million African Americans and over 1 billion Sub-Saharan Africans (reportedly between 1,014 million and, from the World Population Review, 1023 million). I assume that African Americans at IQ 85 and Africans at IQ 70 and have to compete against each other for IQ 130 occupations, then there will be 167,124 African Americans against 55,345 Africans at that level, so I agree with Chisala that the former should predominate. If Africans do better than African Americans on a broad range of intellectual indicators in the US, this is an important anomaly. We can check this against a common standard school leaving examination in the US.
[. . .] A 130 IQ Sub-Saharan African is a lonely person in terms of having contact with people of that ability. He’s probably more likely to end up running a very efficient smuggling/poaching gang than winning a chess championship. The society around him will be an average 70 IQ society and he will adapt to that environment. Meanwhile, an European of the same 130 IQ ability will be surrounded by people who are as smart as him and the societal structure will reflect that.
Ultimately, it’s the density that counts. The table below http://archive.is/ZV0m8 shows (at 15 SD) that a 100 IQ country will have a 130 IQ (and above) persons everywhere (1:44) while in a 70 IQ country they’ll be very rare (1:31,560).
[. . .] Isn’t it likely that sub-Saharan Africa is simply a lesser version of India? Instead of assuming a uniform population with some mean and SD, it seems to me more likely that sub-Saharan Africa is racially diverse, with certain subgroups like the Igbo ahead of others on the continent in terms of aptitude.
We resolve the paradox of low average IQ scores in India partly by realizing that there are probably high IQ castes from which high achieving Indians are drawn from. Wouldn’t this also imply a regression to a higher sub-group mean for the children of these upper caste Indians? Could not a lesser version of this apply to sub-Saharan Africa? I feel like that would go a long way towards explaining many of the data points Chanda points out…
What is weird is this; that 2000 years ago, there were no people even resembling Jews in the middle-east at all.
Turns out that there is not a single ancient Jewish city in what is now called Israel. There is not a single city where the Hebrew script is used on the statues and buildings. There is not a single city where the buildings are in the ancient Jewish architectural style. In fact, there is not even a category of “ancient Jewish architectural style”.
If you check out all the ancient cities in Israel, they are all Greek, and their ruins are still there for you to visit. Their inscriptions are in the Greek script and the buildings are in the ancient Greek architectural styles.
Here is a list of some of the known ancient Greek cities in (and near) Israel; Ecdippa, Seleucia, Ptolemais, Taricheia Arbela, Asochis, Sepphoris, Hippos, Dion, Sycaminum, Bucolon Polis, Itabyrium, Gadara, Abila, Dora, Comus, Gephrus, Crocodilion Polis, Caesarea, Straton’s Tower, Narbata, Scythopolis, Pella, Samaria, Amathus, Ragaba, Gerasa, Apollonia, Sicima, Pegae, Joppa, Arimathea, Jamnia, Port of Jamnia, Lydda, Modiin, Aphaerema, Philadelphia, Birtha, Gazara, Beth Horon, Dok, Jericho, Samaga, Esbus, Medaba, Ladder of Tyre, Azotus, Port of Azotus, Accaron, Jerusalem, Ascalon, Anthedon, Gaza, Marissa, Beth Zur, Hebron, Adora, Engeddi.
The ancient Jewish cities in Israel are,…. well there aren’t any. Not even one.
The Siloam inscription (a water aqueduct which was discovered in Jerusalem in 1838. The tablet was set on the walls of the tunnel) is written Paleo-Hebrew which is not Hebrew at all but Phoenician (which is an archaic form of Greek).
The Phoenician alphabet is so similar to the greater-Greek alphabet (and nothing at all like Hebrew) that only Jews could call it Paleo-Hebrew.
The Christian population of Palestine (Israel) before the Jews ethically cleansed the area was around 20%.
Today the Christian population of Israel (not including the West Bank & Gaza) is about 2% (and this 2% is mainly Arab).
Among the Jewish population, over 25% of the schoolchildren and over 35% of all newborns are of mixed ancestry of both Ashkenazi (Khazar) and Sephardi/Mizrahi descent and increases by 0.5% each year. Over 50% of the Jewish population is of at least a partial Sephardi/Mizrahi descent.
A new study in the New York Times suggests that Saudi Arabia’s state of the art defense system failed to intercept the ballistic missile fired by Yemen’s Houthi rebels which nearly hit Riyadh’s international airport on November 4th. The report contradicts the official claims of the Saudi and American governments, which both announced immediately after the incident that the US-supplied Patriot missile defense system had successfully intercepted the Houthi fired Scud.
The analysis, which utilized open-source material in the form of available video and social media photos of the aftermath of the attack, was conducted by a team of missile experts, and threatens to shake confidence in the US system, which is currently implemented by American allies around the world from South Korea and Taiwan to Turkey, Israel and Japan, among others.
Image via Indian Express, representational image
And notably President Trump himself had announced while aboard Air Force One on the day following the attack, “Our system knocked the missile out of the air.” Trump also emphasized the importance of demonstrable success of the systems and added, “That’s how good we are. Nobody makes what we make, and now we’re selling it all over the world.”
The official story was clear: Saudi forces shot down a ballistic missile fired by Yemen’s Houthi rebel group last month at Saudi Arabia’s capital, Riyadh. It was a victory for the Saudis and for the United States, which supplied the Patriot missile defense system.
…But an analysis of photos and videos of the strike posted to social media suggests that story may be wrong. Instead, evidence analyzed by a research team of missile experts appears to show the missile’s warhead flew unimpeded over Saudi defenses and nearly hit its target, Riyadh’s airport. The warhead detonated so close to the domestic terminal that customers jumped out of their seats.
The Houthi missile was identified at the time as a Burqan-2, revealed in a video of the November 4 launch produced by a Houthi group, and is a variant of the Scud missile commonly used in the region. The attack took Middle East observers by surprise as the missile traveled about 600 miles and reveals a growing sophistication in the Houthi arsenal – all of which led to a number of researchers to claim Iranian origins of the weapon, something which Iran and its regional allies continue to deny.
Image via How Stuff Works/Raytheon
As part of the NYT investigation experts primarily examined the multiple videos and photos of missile debris locations and missile parts, and concluded that the Saudis couldn’t have intercepted the warhead, which further appears to have exploded on impact, something which wouldn’t have happened had the projectile been effectively intercepted.
Saudi officials said the debris, which appears to belong to a downed Burqan-2, showed a successful shootdown. But an analysis of the debris shows that the warhead components – the part of the missile that carries the explosives – were missing. The missing warhead signaled something important to the analysts: that the missile may have evaded Saudi defenses.
…This would explain why the debris in Riyadh only appears to consist of the rear tube. And it suggests that the Saudis may have missed the missile, or only hit the tube after it had separated and begun to fall uselessly toward earth.
Researchers also examined extensive video and eyewitness testimony from the airport and in the vicinity of what the Saudi authorities initially reported as mere falling debris, however, the evidence points to an explosion that could only be explained by the impact of the warhead, which likely evaded the defensive measures. Videos recorded an explosion which occurred at a location very near the main domestic terminal of the airport, the immediate aftermath of which was clearly visible and was strongly felt inside the terminal.
Video sequence showing footage collected from the November 4th attack.
The warhead, the report says, continued on its trajectory after mid-air separation from the rest of the missile, which it is designed to do, making it harder to intercept as it nears its target. Though Saudi officials claimed that it was only debris from an intercepted missile that hit the airport, researchers concluded:
The blast was small, and satellite imagery of the airport taken immediately before and after the blast is not detailed enough to capture the crater from the impact, the analysts said. But it does show ground damage from the emergency vehicles, supporting the finding that the warhead hit just off the runway.
While the Houthis missed their target, Mr. Lewis said, they got close enough to show that their missiles can reach it and can evade Saudi defenses. “A kilometer is a pretty normal miss rate for a Scud,” he said. “The Houthis got very close to creaming that airport.”
One scientist cited in the report, Laura Grego, noted that it’s hugely significant that the Saudis fired five times at the incoming missile and missed. “You shoot five times at this missile and they all miss? That’s shocking,” she said. “That’s shocking because this system is supposed to work.”
Though the Saudi government didn’t respond to the report, and will likely not address the findings, it will be interesting to see the Patriot system’s performance during the next incursion. As fighting is continuing to intensify in neighboring Yemen, it is likely only a matter of time.
[. . .]There is a talk that nonblack Americans have with their kids, too. My own kids, now 19 and 16, have had it in bits and pieces as subtopics have arisen. If I were to assemble it into a single talk, it would look something like the following.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
(1) Among your fellow citizens are forty million who identify as black, and whom I shall refer to as black. The cumbersome (and MLK-noncompliant) term “African-American” seems to be in decline, thank goodness. “Colored” and “Negro” are archaisms. What you must call “the ‘N’ word” is used freely among blacks but is taboo to nonblacks.
“There is a talk that nonblack Americans have with their kids, too.”
(2) American blacks are descended from West African populations, with some white and aboriginal-American admixture. The overall average of non-African admixture is 20-25 percent. The admixture distribution is nonlinear, though: “It seems that around 10 percent of the African American population is more than half European in ancestry.” (Same link.)
(3) Your own ancestry is mixed north-European and northeast-Asian, but blacks will take you to be white.
(4) The default principle in everyday personal encounters is, that as a fellow citizen, with the same rights and obligations as yourself, any individual black is entitled to the same courtesies you would extend to a nonblack citizen. That is basic good manners and good citizenship. In some unusual circumstances, however—e.g., paragraph (10h) below—this default principle should be overridden by considerations of personal safety.
(5) As with any population of such a size, there is great variation among blacks in every human trait (except, obviously, the trait of identifying oneself as black). They come fat, thin, tall, short, dumb, smart, introverted, extroverted, honest, crooked, athletic, sedentary, fastidious, sloppy, amiable, and obnoxious. There are black geniuses and black morons. There are black saints and black psychopaths. In a population of forty million, you will find almost any human type. Only at the far, far extremes of certain traits are there absences. There are, for example, no black Fields Medal winners. While this is civilizationally consequential, it will not likely ever be important to you personally. Most people live and die without ever meeting (or wishing to meet) a Fields Medal winner.
(6) As you go through life, however, you will experience an ever larger number of encounters with black Americans. Assuming your encounters are random—for example, not restricted only to black convicted murderers or to black investment bankers—the Law of Large Numbers will inevitably kick in. You will observe that the means—the averages—of many traits are very different for black and white Americans, as has been confirmed by methodical inquiries in the human sciences.
(8) These differences are magnified by the hostility many blacks feel toward whites. Thus, while black-on-black behavior is more antisocial in the average than is white-on-white behavior, average black-on-white behavior is a degree more antisocial yet.
(9) A small cohort of blacks—in my experience, around five percent—is to whites and will go to great lengths to inconvenience or harm us. A much larger cohort of blacks—around half—will go along passively if the five percent take leadership in some event. They will do this out of racial solidarity, the natural willingness of most human beings to be led, and a vague feeling that whites have it coming.
(10) Thus, while always attentive to the particular qualities of individuals, on the many occasions where you have nothing to guide you but knowledge of those mean differences, use statistical common sense:
(10a) Avoid concentrations of blacks not all known to you personally.
(10c) If planning a trip to a beach or amusement park at some date, find out whether it is likely to be swamped with blacks on that date (neglect of that one got me the closest I have ever gotten to death by gunshot).
(10f) Do not settle in a district or municipality run by black politicians.
(10g) Before voting for a black politician, scrutinize his/her character much more carefully than you would a white.
(10h) Do not act the Good Samaritan to blacks in apparent distress, e.g., on the highway.
(10i) If accosted by a strange black in the street, smile and say something polite but keep moving.
(11) The mean intelligence of blacks is much lower than for whites. The least intelligent ten percent of whites have IQs below 81; forty percent of blacks have IQs that low. Only one black in six is more intelligent than the average white; five whites out of six are more intelligent than the average black. These differences show in every test of general cognitive ability that anyone, of any race or nationality, has yet been able to devise. They are reflected in countless everyday situations. “Life is an IQ test.”
(12) There is a magnifying effect here, too, caused by affirmative action. In a pure meritocracy there would be very low proportions of blacks in cognitively demanding jobs. Because of affirmative action, the proportions are higher. In government work, they are very high. Thus, in those encounters with strangers that involve cognitive engagement, ceteris paribus the black stranger will be less intelligent than the white. In such encounters, therefore—for example, at a government office—you will, on average, be dealt with more competently by a white than by a black. If that hostility-based magnifying effect (paragraph 8) is also in play, you will be dealt with more politely, too. “The DMV lady“ is a statistical truth, not a myth.
(13) In that pool of forty million, there are nonetheless many intelligent and well-socialized blacks. (I’ll use IWSB as an ad hocabbreviation.) You should consciously seek opportunities to make friends with IWSBs. In addition to the ordinary pleasures of friendship, you will gain an amulet against potentially career-destroying accusations of prejudice.
(14) Be aware, however, that there is an issue of supply and demand here. Demand comes from organizations and businesses keen to display racial propriety by employing IWSBs, especially in positions at the interface with the general public—corporate sales reps, TV news presenters, press officers for government agencies, etc.—with corresponding depletion in less visible positions. There is also strong private demand from middle- and upper-class whites for personal bonds with IWSBs, for reasons given in the previous paragraph and also (next paragraph) as status markers.
(15) Unfortunately the demand is greater than the supply, so IWSBs are something of a luxury good, like antique furniture or corporate jets: boasted of by upper-class whites and wealthy organizations, coveted by the less prosperous. To be an IWSB in present-day US society is a height of felicity rarely before attained by any group of human beings in history. Try to curb your envy: it will be taken as prejudice (see paragraph 13).
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
You don’t have to follow my version of the talk point for point; but if you are white or Asian and have kids, you owe it to them to give them some version of the talk. It will save them a lot of time and trouble spent figuring things out for themselves. It may save their lives.
@all the guys saying that the Houthies hit a nuclear reactor:
Please, stop spreading that lie!
Inform yourself a bit (in case you are not willingly disinforming here and infiltrating in your posts the typical sentence you are responsible for leaking today/ this week…, as I have witnessed is the custom in all the so called “US alt-media” by “commenters” and “analysts” ) to know that the nuclear central that was hit in UAE is still under construction and so there was no nuclear reactor there. The attack was made as a warning to the UAE for them to avoid meddling to provoke divisions and seditions amongst Yemeni resistance, since most probably the Houthis saw the move by Saleh, trying to turn the military against them, as a plot coming from his former companion of cabinet Hadi ( who is supported by UAE ) from Aden. The blockade was planned to prepare the field, debilitating the Houthies for the following coup by Saleh in Sana´a, which would be followed by the offensive coming from Aden by Hadi and his proxies to take over Sana´a and the North.
The leader of Ansarolah, Abdul Malik Al-Houthi, explains everything that happened here ( In Spanish).
Related to the guy who has doubts about B´s analyses, I cannot but agree. First, on what facts/ sources does he base his statements that Saleh was operated on by the Russians?… Is it not a way to connect the Russians with Saleh and try to bring them into the Yemeni conflict, where they are not taking part in any way? The same way attempts are made to bring them into every conflict in the world so as to get them deep in the mud? Fortunately, they have avoided it in Ukraine, Syria and so on. From my point of view, the fact that the Russians could mantain their embassy at Sana´a could well be due to the more trust they have from all the Yemeni people based on their history of not meddling in the country, and support received from the USSR. Just they are not so hated as the US Americans and full stop.
Second, we have this insistence on Saleh as an “agent of peace”, which today fits perfectly with the MSM tune,in spite of him being such a “snake”….
Third, for two or three days I have spent here, I have met at least one article praising Flynn, who was of the same ideology as all the alt-righters and nazis who constituted the Trump initial administration. He was at the head of Breitbart Journalism and co-authored a book, with a certain Ledeen, promoting war on Iran and Islam, the same Ledeen who also wrote another book about spreading International Fascism to achieve a New Fascist World Order…
Last but not least, I am finding amongst this charming commentariat the same flatterers I have met at The Saker, Fort Russ, The Duran, and so on…Curiously, or not so, they never disagree with anything the “analysts” at every one of those sites could wrote, which leads me to think that they are nothing but ‘bots’. Curiously, or not so, they are expanding here more than usual, this time by linking Twitter comments by supposed Yemenis who are all pro-Saleh…. Well, yesterday, I took the trouble to read a bit along one of the Twitters linked here, that of “Ammar Aulaqi”, offered here as a reliable source on events in Yemen, and got to understand that the guy has double US and Yemeni citizenship…Despite seeming to love very much his country by publishing beautiful photos and worrynig a lot about the children, he was in support of Saleh all the way, to the extent that, in front of a photo of a table full of bottles of vodka which was taken at Saleh´s hideout after it was taken over by the Houthies, he found such a habit “cool”…It is beyond me why a double nationalized US citizen could anytime consider anything good could come for the Yemeni people so loved by him from a traitor who left its people languish in poverty for decades and besides swallowed about 10 or more bottles of vodka daily with his peers…. Of course, seeing his photo in profile, disguised as a prince of KSA and the kind of Yemeni “diwans” he post as a sample of Yemeni homes ( huge, ugly and extravagant westernized diwans not in the reach, and mainly not in the taste, of most of the Yemeni people ) one cannot but conclude that, in any case, he is most probably one of the few who benefitted from Saleh´s long rule and so had the opportunity to go studying in the US, if not because of, besides, sharing the same ideology and plans for the future of Yemen….
Of course, all these Twitter accounts could well also be fake….
Professor Charles W. Kingsfield Jr. announces his mission statement to his first-year contracts class at Harvard Law School.
You teach yourselves the law, but I train your mind. You come in here with a skull full of mush; you leave thinking like a lawyer.
Kingsfield is a fictional character, from the novel, 1973 movie, and television series The Paper Chase. John Houseman, as Kingsfield, had as memorable a voice and almost as fearsome a demeanor as Darth Vader, who would appear four years after The Paper Chase movie. Houseman won an Academy Award and became the spokesman for Smith Barney, stating its tag line with aristocratic frost: “They make money the old fashioned way…they earn it.”
Teaching his charges to think like lawyers meant developing and honing their ability to think logically, to analyze, and to present arguments and conclusions with precision and clarity. More’s the pity Kingsfield was fictional; most people would benefit from such instruction. Harvard’s fictional One L’s were a bright lot. If their skulls were full of mush, then skulls today are full of the polluted runoff from TV, internet pornography, texting, and social media.
Garbage in, garbage out, as the computer programmers say. It’s far beyond the scope of this article to examine all the garbage out there that passes as thought. We’ll look at a sliver, what can be termed group attribution. Beyond the quality that defines a large group, it is generally impossible to make a categorically true statement about all of the members of that group. Yet, the fallacy is ubiquitous across the political spectrum, from social justice warriors babbling about white privilege to alt-righters claiming that members of various races are inherently incapable of living together.
White men can’t jump. Except that most of the 16 men who have cleared the 2.4 meter mark (7 ft., 10 1/4 in.) in the high jump have been white, hailing from places like Russia, Eastern Europe, and Sweden. (The world record, 2.45 meters, is held by Javier Sotomayor, a Cuban.) The problem with group generalizations is that a counterexample invalidates them.
What difference does it make? Group generalizations are usually based on an average characteristic within the group. Let’s say the average white man can’t jump 3 feet (that may be too high, given the obesity epidemic). What’s more interesting, the mass of white men who can’t jump that height, or the exceptions who can jump over twice that height? Do you wonder why the average white guy can’t jump very high? Or how men or women of any race can learn and train themselves to jump over a foot higher than their own height? Who would you study if you were trying to improve your own jumping?
Most of our social structures are geared to the average, or worse. Students on the far right side of the intelligence bell curve (yes, there is an intelligence bell curve) are stultified in schools so oriented. Escape and refuge generally involve paying large sums of money for the comparatively few schools ostensibly devoted to educating the bright and brilliant. In higher education, a significant part of the social sciences (a misnomer) are wastelands focused on groups and averages, using that dreariest branch of mathematics, statistics.
Imagine an Olympic training facility that accepted any white male, devoting its resources to raising the average high jump from 36 to 37 inches, though its trainees would win no gold medals. Isn’t that analogous to the education system? The best universities draw applicants from around the world and accept 5 to 10 percent of them, indicating a shortage of high quality institutions relative to the demand. Meanwhile, billions are spent raising average academic performance the equivalent of 36 to 37 inches.
That’s accepting the charitable assumption that our education system accomplishes its stated goals, which it does not. These days, illiterates with no mathematical skills beyond counting on their fingers graduate from high school.
Anomalous individuals, not the average ones, propel civilization. The fixation on groups and their averages is intellectually and practically counterproductive. Even the notion of identifying the exceptional is falling into disrepute, and that has something to do with the present state of the world. Overall quality of life is a reflection of overall quality of thought: garbage in, garbage out.
Muslims are violent, bent on world domination, and are guided by the Koran, which justifies their behavior and goal. One can find that generalization in various forms all over the internet. No denying that it’s true for some Muslims. However find one peace-loving Muslim who doesn’t read or follow the Koran (Do all those who call themselves Christians read and follow the Bible?) and the generalization is invalidated.
What difference does it make? Take the generalization to its logical end, and you can justify a preemptive genocide stretching from Indonesia to Morocco. If every one of 1.3 billion Muslims is bent on ruling the world and killing you, you’d better kill them first. A “Clash of Civilizations” has been invoked to justify US military interventionism in Islamic lands. Except by the warped standards of its promoters, that effort has not gone well: a never ending war on terrorism that begets more terrorism, huge refugee flows, increasing hostility towards the US, destruction, chaos, and a massive waste of blood and treasure for all concerned. Garbage in, garbage out.
Contrast the US effort in the Middle East to Russia’s, which seems to be guided by a more precise and accurate formulation: some Muslims are violent and bent on world domination. Russia identified such a group operating in Syria and Iraq. At the invitation of the Syrian government and allied with Iranian, Iraqi, and Hezbollah militias, it has reversed ISIS’s territorial gains and is in the process of exterminating those members who have not fled. In so doing, Russia has enhanced the security of ordinary people in Syria and Iraq and raised its diplomatic status throughout the Middle East. Smart in, smart out.
One problem with logic, clarity, and precision is that like Professor Kingsfield, they’re not warm, cuddly, fuzzy, and friendly. At the end of The Paper Chase movie, after months of back and forth with Kingsfield, student James T. Hart, played by Timothy Bottoms, tries to tell the professor how much he and his class have meant to him. Kingsfield doesn’t even remember Hart’s name. He‘s so deep into the fascinating nooks, crannies, and interstices of contract law (they are fascinating) that everything else has become secondary or irrelevant.
Logic, clarity, and precision are hard work and won’t get you invited to parties. They are also the foundation of the scientific method, which deals in hypotheses and theories, but never the comforting certainties of prejudice, generalization, and belief. The scientific method can lead to self-induced cognitive dissonance for those who cannot hold in their heads inconsistent hypotheses simultaneously.
If the world appears wildly chaotic, bordering on insane, check the programming. Garbage in, garbage out. The current state of affairs reflects the predominant quantity and quality of thought. What’s true at the individual level—there is no hope of improving life without improving thought—applies to groups, including the group known as humanity.
One hypothesis can be advanced with virtual certainty: among the masses hooked into the internet, exchanging pictures of cute animals and the fascinating details of their fascinating lives, this SLL post will not go viral.
Is peace plan based on the Trump’s peace plan which is derived from the Saudi peace plan? Thanks Mr. Trump.
A diplomatic plan being formulated by the United States to renew the peace process between Israel and the PA, according to Yisrael Hayom. According the London-based Arabic-language Al-Arabi Al-Jadid, American diplomats in Cairo, who wished to remain anonymous, have confirmed the reports.
Under the temporary plan, said to be acceptable to Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, there would first be reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas that will allow the PA to hold power in Gaza. Israel and the PA would discuss the gradual establishment of full PA control of Areas A and B in Judea and Samaria. In accordance with the progress of the political process and the negotiations between the sides, a summit would be held in Cairo, with the participation of Egypt, Jordan, the United States, Israel and the PA, in which the parties would discuss ways to facilitate the continuation of the diplomatic process and expand the authority of the independent state to Gaza.
In the last stage of the plan, discussions would begin on a predefined timetable regarding core issues, such as the status of eastern Jerusalem, the annexation of large blocs of Jewish communities beyond the 1949 Armistice Line, the complete freeze of construction in isolated communities and the uprooting of communities that are not part of the blocs based on land swaps and a solution to the refugee issue.
Report: Secret Saudi plan includes Israeli nuclear disarmament
Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar says it has received a letter from Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir to Crown Prince Muhammad Salman in which he summarizes discussions and recommendations on a project to establish relations between the Saudis and Israel, according to what he called the strategic partnership agreement with the United States.
Citing Al-Akhbar, Maariv reports the document, which includes Israeli nuclear disarmament, proves what has been leaked since US President Donald Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia last May, according to which Washington will begin efforts to sign a peace treaty between Saudi Arabia and Israel, including reciprocal visits, to Tel Aviv, headed by a recent secret visit by the crown prince. The document also includes “the size of the concessions that Riyadh will present in order to end the Palestinian issue,” as well as “its concerns about receiving support against Iran and Hezbollah.”
Just reported by HispanTV News : “The Yemeni popular movement Ansarolah accuses former President Ali Abdullah Saleh of organizing a coup against his alliance. Call on all groups to maintain the unity and stability of the country”.
It seems that the clashes between the two factions are circunscribed to the city of Sana´a.
Yemeni people should learn from the Lebanese people on how mantaining the unity of the country is a must to avoid being exterminated by the “Axis of Evil”.
Of course, something must be done for the relief of the suffering of the civil population and achieve the rising of blockade, but to give up the fight just to get Saleh at the helms again is like if all this years of sacrifice would have bee for nothing.
When I visited Yemen, almost a decade and a half ago, under Saleh rule, poverty was widespread there, people was said to eat only one meal a day, and the only people who had a university degree were those original from former Popular Democratic Republic in the South, who had had the opportunity to study in Cuba and the USSR, being at that time no opportunity for nothing except allowing them working as travel guides, with the most ambitious amongst them wishing to leave the country not seeing any future at all there.
I can remember people affected by Poliomyelitis, a disase already erradicated in our developed world, like that man who was oblied to walk bent, like an animal, with two wooden blocks in his hands as if they were shoes…..Also I remember getting very impressed by a little girl playing with other children in the old city of Saada, who had one of her eyes completely in process of destruction by a serious infection,..Both her and the other children seemed to accept such a tragic destiny as a natural curse….
Before my travel, as usual, I had read a bit about the country, and amongst the things I had read was about some kidnapping of tourists which were taken place for to exert pressure on the government for providing electricity or water to the village or any other thing like this. They were adding at those readings that the kidnapped tourists were always so well treated that there had been cases where the tourists had asked for remaining some aditional days in the village when their liberation was about to come….Such friendly, warm and kindhearted is the people living in Arabia Félix….They do not deserve such a leader as Saleh who, most probably, will loot all the funds coming for reconstruction….
During this travel, my group, as the proletarian travelers we were, stayed at humble hotels and people´s homes, but, for one day we stayed in a four stars hotel at Maareb, most probably because there was no other option in that conflictive zone very hostile to the government, only for four hours of sleep before starting the crossing of Ramlat Al Sab´atayn desert to get to Hadramawt valley, the only guests I could see at that hotel were a group of about four tall anglosaxon guys wearing caps….Although at that time I was very young and ignorant about what was being cooked around the world, while I was having a funny time with my travel companions,they did not go unnoticed by me and I got to think that they only could be CIA agents…well, they were not tourists, I can asure you…..I really wondered what the hell they were doing there….
“QUESTION: I’m Marek Walkuski, Polish Public Radio.
MS NAUERT: Okay. Nice to meet you. Welcome to the State Department.
QUESTION: Deputy Assistant Secretary McCarrick told a group of European journalists that, I quote, “We don’t see the possibility that Nord Stream 2 is going to be built. That is not something that we are going to assume is going to happen.” Could you explain what is the statement based on? And I’m wondering if the topic has been discussed during the meeting between Secretary Tillerson and German foreign minister and what’s the conclusion of their discussion if, in fact, it was one of the topics.
MS NAUERT: Yeah. I can tell you that that conversation did not come up. The Secretary and the foreign minister had a very positive meeting in which they talked about the DPRK, North Korea. They talked about the humanitarian crisis in Yemen and the importance of Saudi Arabia opening additional ports and ways that we can get humanitarian aid into Yemen. They talked about a few other matters as well. Nord Stream 2 was not one of the topics that came up in my presence. Now, they may have had a separate sideline conversation that I did not witness, so that may have come up.
In terms of where exactly we are on Nord Stream 2 – pardon me one second – another topic related to that is the multi-line Turkish Stream, as I understand it. So our position on this would be that Europe is certainly working to try to diversify where it gets its energy. I’ve spoken with some of your colleagues before, people from that part of the world as well, and recognizing that there should be and could be more sources of energy. We have seen in the very cold winter months where Vladimir Putin – which is where a lot of your energy comes from in particular in Poland – where he will turn down, turn off those energy supplies, causing costs to go up and causing people to lose heat on occasion. So we know that Europe is working to diversify its energy sector overall. It’s also assessing projects that would undermine some of these efforts.
We agree with many of our European partners that Nord Stream 2 and a multi-line Turkish Stream would reinforce Russian dominance in Europe’s gas markets. It would reduce opportunities for diversification of energy sources. It would pose security risks in an already tense Baltic Sea region and it would advance Russia’s goal of undermining Ukraine – that’s a particular concern of ours – by ending Ukraine’s role as a transit country for Russian gas exports to get to Europe. Construction of Nord Stream 2 would concentrate about 75 percent of Russian gas imports to the EU through a single route, creating a potential checkpoint that would significantly increase Europe’s vulnerability to a supply disruption. So we believe that these two projects would enable Gazprom to cut off transit via Ukraine and still meet demand in Western Europe, which would economically undermine Ukraine by depriving it of about $2 billion in annual transit revenue. Okay?
QUESTION: But is this statement correct, that you don’t believe that the project would be built, that Nord Stream 2 would be built? And Secretary Tillerson called recently the Nord Stream 2 unwise. What are you doing to stop this unwise project?
MS NAUERT: So, sir, I don’t have the Secretary’s comments in front of me, so I hesitate to comment on having something that I —
QUESTION: Two days ago at the Woodrow Wilson Center.
MS NAUERT: I understand. I understand. I just don’t have the exact quote in front of me.
QUESTION: Okay.
MS NAUERT: So I’m not – I’m just not going to comment on that. And the other person who made a remark, I don’t – I’m afraid I don’t have that with me either, so – okay?
QUESTION: Yes.
QUESTION: Can we move on? Heather, can we move on please?