Soccer Dad

Around the web, 11/09/05

A reminder: this week's host for Haveil Havalim is View from a Height and he may be reached at jsharf at jsharf dot com.

Also, as usual, you may submit your entry at Conservative Cat's handy dandy carnival submission page.

And I'm happy to announce that Blog Carnival has a carnival submission form too as well as an archive of links to past hosts going back to June.

Clarity and Resolve reports on Senate hearings looking into the sort of friendly propaganda that is being spread by our friends the Saudi in "A little slow on the uptake."

(More on these hearings at the Counterterrorism Blog).

In a related, but slightly older story, Crossing the Rubicon2, in "Tainted Teachings" points to an article from the JTA that Saudi financing is affecting what American public school children are taught about infidels Israel and the Middle East in general.
(Where credit is due: Pillage Idiot e-mailed me about this a few weeks ago.)

Speaking of Pillage Idiot, go to Postcards from a meeting in Argentina and see the results of what happens when someone with way too much time on his hands gets a hold of Photoshop!

A Simple Jew drove to Baltimore this past Sunday to see the news that Uncle Moishy was back in town from Seventh Row Center.

Mrs. Soccer Dad took our 2 younger children also. We hadn't been to Uncle Moishy in a while; since our older 3 outgrew him. She, too, was amazed at how thrilled the little ones were with the funny guy running around with a big "Mem" on his hat. Adults may laugh at Barney or Uncle Moishy, but it takes a certain skill to reach a specific audience, but Uncle Moishy has a tremendous skill in his ability to thrill the young children.

AbbaGav does not like children's stories and takes it out on Thomas the Tank Engine, which his children love and he most decidedly does not. (This reminds of an e-mail I once received from Elie's Expositions - before he was blogging - about a Freudian reading of the Cat in the Hat.)

A commenter, Chen, to my crossposted "Fixing Potholes, Killing Jews" at Israpundit argues that the Bush administration deserves as much blame as the media for whitewashing Hamas. Daled Amos makes a similar point (or actually derives a bigger point from the American treatment of Hamas) in Allies and Interests.

A number of bloggers have commented on the tenth anniversary of the assassination of PM Yitzchak Rabin, It's Almost Supernatural provides an alternative reality What if Rabin hadn't died?. I missed the irony here; it was meant to be mocking those who claim that killing Rabin killed the peace process too.

And I agree with that. If anything, the assassination re-energized the peace process and in the weeks after, new Prime Minster withdrew Israeli troops from, Jenin, Tulkarem, Kalkilya, Bethlehem, Ramallah and Shechem (Nablus) in quick succession as the Likud and the political Right were (unfairly in my view) tainted by the assassination.

Taking control of those cities gave Arafat and the PA the opportunity to show they were committed to peace. Of course they never fulfilled their Oslo obligations by securing the areas they received and in early 1996, Hamas -now unimpeded - had developed the operational ability to strike at Israel with a series of suicide bombings that killed over 60 in a week's time.

Withdrawing from territory in 1995 gave Hamas the opportunity to expand its operations against Israel. In 2005, Aaron Mannes argues, the Winner on Gaza Sidelines due to Israel's withdrawal is Iran.

Elie's Expositions notes that he's not a party guy. We were college roommates and ... Oh not that kind of party. He's not sold on the platforms of either political party. That's fine, just make sure to vote Republican.

DovBear says all's well just as long as you vote (or voted) Democrat.

(via Instapundit) Meanwhile Cafe Hayek argues that we should vote for Alan Alda:

Alda's opponent who is evidently a Democrat, touts his economic plan that will create a million jobs. The moderator asks Alda how many jobs his plan will create. Zero, Alda says. In fact, he adds, I'll cut jobs. I'll cut jobs in the federal government. Besides, he adds, Presidents don't create jobs, entrepreneurs do. My job as President is to get out of the way and let the market work.

Though, a liberal show, the West Wing (according to this account) really seems to have created a substantial Republican candidate instead of a caricature. I remember hearing (or reading) that exchange above. But Cafe Hayek mentions others. It would be nice if a real politician spoke like that.

Maybe no one like Alan Alda's character will really be President, but George W. Bush currently holds that job. A writer named Ezzie Goldish is still Bullish on Bush. That writer is blogger SerAndEz and he's been published in OpinionJournal! Congratulations!

You wouldn't know it from reading the newspapers, but a major terror trial is going on. The Counterterrorism blog, though tells us that the Prosecutor Begins Closing Arguments in Sami Al-Arian Trial. And in Debunking the Paradigm of Inexpensive Terrorism links to an article arguing that following the money is an effective tool against terror.

Critical Mastiff let's us know what the real name of Osama Bin Laden's organization is in Creative Translation.

Chayyei Sarah wrote a particularly poignant account of David Hatuel's engagement, Good News, and the Bittersweet. Last year he was interviewed as part of the Tisha B'av program and I was amazed by his lack of bitterness over his terrible and cruel loss. May he find some measure of comfort with his new wife.

Elder of Ziyon reports on the Simpsons in Arabic and asks the all important question:

if you take the beer out of Homer/Omar's life, how many minutes are left per episode?

.

He also links to a sickening video from Iran. (SerAndEz also linked to the cartoon and they both credit Amshinover.) I saw the cartoon and it reminded my of a (live action) video I saw a few years ago presented by Itamar Marcus of Palestinian Media Watch. Go here and scroll down to "Rape Libel" and view the (disturbing) video there. The action in both videos isn't the same, but struck me as being rather similar.

Israel Perspectives takes a bus ride to nowhere and meets up with Jewish Destiny.

Israelly Cool! notes (as several other bloggers have) that Russia now wants Israel's security fence technology. He notes, though, that maybe this development wasn't without warning.

Jack's Shack talks about the Big ape in the room. Fortunately it was a herbivore.

Posted by SoccerDad at November 9, 2005 5:45 AM