And If We Don't Give the Palestinians What They Want....?

When I was 16 years old, I believed that Israel and Palestine could come to some kind of agreement and just drop everything. I believed that this was about a homeland. I no longer think so, because I became convinced of the reality that Mark Steyn is talking about:

“That’s why there was no peace in 1948, no peace under the British mandate in the 1930s, no peace at the time of the 1922 partition because one party to the dispute wants to kill the other. So, if they are wedded to that, then you got to put pressure on the party that doesn’t want to kill each other, to make concession – to keep throwing concessions in the face of the beast that wants to devour it and I think that’s – if you look at where he’s applying the pressure, I think that tells you a lot about the fundamental fraudulence of these negotiations.”

Now it could be that all this talk of wanting to drive Israel into the see is so much bluster. But if you were an Israeli Jew, how much would you want to bet on it? Palestine could have had peace in 1999, when Israel offered them more or less the same deal that Obama wants them to offer now. Palestine chose war, instead. Because war is what they want.

So war is what Palestine gets. And so long as Israel refuses to surrender anything to an enemy they have no reason to trust, it's a war they will slowly lose.

I Am So Smart! S-M-R-T!

Glenn Reynolds quotes Gary Becker on the problem of "capitalism" in South America:

In essence, crony capitalism often creates private monopolies that hurt consumers compared to their welfare under competition. The excesses of cronyism have provided ammunition to parties of the left that are openly hostile to capitalism and neo-liberal policies. Yet when these parties come to power they usually do not reduce the importance of political influence but shift power to groups that support them. A distinguishing characteristic of Chile since the reforms of the early 1980's is the growth in competitive capitalism at the expense of crony capitalism. This shift more than anything else explains the economic rise of Chile during the past 25 years that has made Chile the most economically successful of all Latin American nations.

"Crony capitalism" is more or less what I had in mind writing about Mexicoil and cash crops yesterday. It amounts to a gentle kind of fascism, and runs counter to what every free-market-loving liberal and libertarian desires.

Yesterday I was lecturing my Modern History class about the Great Depression, and how the worst thing you can do when the stock market is tanking is panic. He who keep his head while everyone else loses theirs is likely to come out on top. Unfortunately, Latin America has been in one state of politico-economic panic or another for the last 200 years.

But wait, there's more! Donald Sensing has more of the costs leading to a declining birth rate. I'm less convinced that his assertions are as powerful as economic ones. There are plenty of us who don't really care what the feminists and eco-freaks think about our young'uns. But in the cultural centers on the coasts, the image of mass overpopulation and the toil and drudgery of Motherhood surely influences behavior.

We run from the wrong fears, and into the wrong solutions.


UPDATE: Mark Steyn has more, especially as relating to Hugo Chavez. You know, Mister President-for-Life.

Hell is Repetition...

...for how else could rehearsing a stage production over and over and over again, from Saturday to Wednesday, be call Hell Week?

I have a few essay's brewing, and eventually I'll get that dagnabbed music list finished. But for the nonce, I am indisposed.

Here, go read Mark Steyn. Mayhaps we can start a betting pool as to the final date for the rise of the European Caliphate.

Steyn to Europe: You're DOOMED.

The default mode of our elites is that anything that happens--from terrorism to tsunamis--can be understood only as deriving from the perniciousness of Western civilization. As Jean-Francois Revel wrote, "Clearly, a civilization that feels guilty for everything it is and does will lack the energy and conviction to defend itself."

Like anything else, survival is ultimately a choice. The body may will it, short-term, but it is the mind that must plan for it, long-term. Civilizations often die because they've succeeded for so long that they no longer think it requires work to do so.

Read the whole thing, as they say, but I'm suddenly applying this line of thinking to the much ballyhooed dearth of men in higher education. The so-called "War Against Boys" may be a factor, and the feminization of university culture as well, but ultimately, isn't it because boys are choosing not to succeed? And that we're letting them?

I'm a high school teacher: the curriculum is not that difficult. So what is it that's convinced large numbers of young men that education isn't worth it? Call me a crank, but I think it's the way that men have managed to convince themselves that ignorance is spiritual purity and decadence is manliness. I'm open to other suggestions as well.


UPDATE: Belmont Club has more, here and here, both of which aim towards the idea that the West has become a house divided against itself. It's citizenry still cling, if half-heartedly, to the old values, it's military, for the most part, stands firm, but its intellectual and political elite want nothing to do with mere survival. What Belmont Club doesn't say is what the Left wants: transcendence, of the idea of nation, of market, even of self, to attain a higher and better world. Yes, even at their most cynical and bigoted, that is what they want. They also are aware that violence oftimes begets violence. In fact, they are aware of it to such an acute degree that often that is all about violence that they know.

It should make anyone stand up and pay attention that the Military devotes such resources to "Information Operations." As Wretchard writes, we want the guys with guns to do their work and go. But if the elite fears the military, and the populace cherishes it, and this trend continues...well, I hear the Romans loved their freedom, too.