On Apr 27, 2010, at 3:50 PM, martin wrote:
> I guess I just don't understand the resistance (to the discussion).
> I can understand why Doug might not want it to take place on this
> list. And on WBAI too, since his show is a big part of his identity.
> But the resistance seems to be to the idea of the discussion itself,
> and makes me wonder. Why?
Because it's an achingly stupid waste of time, that's why. Max put the political point very well:
> The narrative of U.S. historic involvement in the ME, the why and the
> how, is too important to be displaced by a bull story. Understanding
> that history, I humbly submit, is central to understanding U.S.
> foreign policy 'in the large,' and by extension to general
> consciousness-raising. It's prerequisite to a mass left politics.
Aside from that, the method of argument is brain-damaging. All the pseudo-science about the melting point of steel and the missing hole in the Pentagon becomes, as my blog commenter put it, is the form paranoia takes, regardless of the truth content of the original obsession.