<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML><HEAD><TITLE>Re: Hitchens on genocide</TITLE> <META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <STYLE type=text/css>BLOCKQUOTE { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } DL { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } UL { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } OL { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } LI { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } </STYLE> <META content="MSHTML 5.50.4611.1300" name=GENERATOR></HEAD> <BODY bgColor=#ffffff> <DIV>Mark Pavlick:</DIV> <DIV></X-TAB></DIV> <DIV><EM>If anyone has evidence that Hitchens recanted the sentiments supportive of genocide expressed in this piece, and apologized to any of the people he attacked, maybe they could post it.</EM></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>A year or so ago a couple of my friends went out drinking with Hitch in NY and they confronted him on this topic. He took nothing back and reinforced his point, which was (is) that the 18th century Enlightenment was one of the greatest steps forward for civilization, and that the native population had nothing that could compete with it, and really nothing of value to offer. He echoed Saul Bellow's crack about there being no great novelist or philosopher among the redskins, who preferred climbing trees and skinning animals. Even though he concurred with Bellow on this point, he still opposed Bellow's pro-Greater Israel politics (in Martin Amis's memoir there's a funny scene where Hitch assaults Bellow over dinner, bringing all conversation to a halt), though now he's a foot soldier in the great War on Terror, who's to say anymore? I'm waiting for this battered shoe to drop, when Hitch goes all out and supports Sharon's violence (because, after all, Hamas is theocratic, probably fascist; and since Israel helped it along to offset PLO accommodation, don't they have a moral duty to now rectify that mistake?). </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>DP</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV></X-SIGSEP></BODY></HTML>