Thursday: Hili dialogue

September 29, 2022 • 6:30 am

It’s the penultimate day of September: Thursday, September 29, 2022, and National Coffee Day, though of course that’s every day caffeine junkies. One of my friends was just forbidden both caffeine and dairy products for two weeks during a course of antibiotics, and she’s quite desperate for a cup of Joe (she takes it with milk, of course).  And imagine a world without coffee!  Then think of all the drinks BETTER than coffee that don’t exist because the plants never evolved.

It’s also National Mocha Day, National Biscotti Day, Goose Day (the bird), Broadway Musicals Day, and World Heart Day.

In honor of Broadway Musicals Day, here’s a great song from the original cast album of Lerner and Loewe’s Brigadoon, one of my favorite musicals (1947). I use to listen to my parents’ album for hours, and I still know all the words to the songs. This is one of the best. Do not accept any substitute for the original cast album!

Stuff that happened on September 29 is very thin, and includes:

The history of the region is so complicated that I won’t even begin to recount it, but here’s the declaration itself and “Mandatory Palestine” in 1946, before the division into Israel and the Palestinian territories. Back then the area did extend “from the [Jordan] river to the sea.”

  • 1954 – The convention establishing CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) is signed.

Here’s the complex dedicated to the study of particle physics. It’s hard to find out what country it’s in, as it sits very close to (or even on) the border between Switzerland and France.

It’s surrounded by the famous Large Hadron Collider (LHC), which is underground and traced by the yellow line below:

  • 1975 – WGPR becomes the first black-owned-and-operated television station in the US.

Here’s the studio, which was in Detroit. The station was eventually sold and now appears to be a broadcast museum:

  • 1990 – The YF-22, which would later become the F-22 Raptor, flies for the first time.

The YF-22 was a prototype of which two remain in museums. The F-22 Raptor, however, is a tactical fighter that’s still in service for the the U.S. Air Force. Here’s a video showing it in action:

 

Da Nooz:

*If you want to see how much of a failure the Russian Army has been in Ukraine, the NYT has a story featuring  “‘Putin is a fool’: Intercepted calls reveal Russian Army in disarray.” Here’s the backstory:

From trenches, dugouts and in occupied homes in the area around Bucha, a western suburb of Kyiv, Russian soldiers disobeyed orders by making unauthorized calls from their cellphones to their wives, girlfriends, friends and parents hundreds of miles from the front line.

The New York Times has exclusively obtained recordings of thousands of calls that were made throughout March and intercepted by Ukrainian law enforcement agencies from this pivotal location.

Reporters verified the authenticity of these calls by cross-referencing the Russian phone numbers with messaging apps and social media profiles to identify soldiers and family members. The Times spent almost two months translating the recordings, which have been edited for clarity and length.

It’s amazing that there’s an ability to intercept these calls, but of course we know that’s possible. As you scroll down the page, you’ll hear call after call in Russian, translated into English, and also read commentary from the NYT.

A few examples. First, war crimes, and they may be able to use the names of the callers to find war criminals:

We were given an order to kill everyone we see.

. . . . Fuck.There are corpses lying around on the road. Civilians are just lying around. It’sf ucked up.

Right on the road?

Yes.

. . . In what may amount to evidence of war crimes, a soldier named Sergey confesses to his girlfriend that his captain ordered the execution of three men who were “walking past our storehouse,” and that he has become “a killer.”

And there are the revelations about abysmal military failure, coupled with criticisms of Putin.

Our offense has stalled.  We’re losing this war.

Putin is a fool. He wants to take Kyiv. But there’s no way we can do it.

Mom, this war is the stupidest decision our government ever made, I think.

There were 400 paratroopers.  And only 38 of them survived.…Because our commanders sent soldiers to the slaughter.

The parade of killings, military foulups, execution of civilians goes on and, in the end, it leads to this:

Back home in Russia, the phone calls reveal that the mounting deaths are beginning to reverberate in military towns, where tight-knit communities and families exchange news of casualties. Relatives describe rows of corpses and coffins arriving in their cities, as soldiers warn that even more bodies will soon return. One woman tells her husband that a military funeral was held every day that week. In shock, some families say they have begun to see psychologists.

Let’s talk about Iran. It took the death of one woman, Mahsa Amini, to mobilize Iranian women, and now it appears to be mobilizing Western opinion. Do people not realize what’s been going on in Iran for decades. I hope they will now. Several articles have just appeared from Iranian women. (I reproduce some tweets at the bottom.)

*Masih Alinejad, someone whose words I often post here, has an op-ed in the Washington Post, “Women are leading a revolution in Iran. When will Western feminists help?”

The news of [Mahsa’s] death has triggered outrage throughout Iran. Tens of thousands of demonstrators are defying security forces to ask why an innocent young woman lost her life to religious radicals who merely wanted to show off their militant male power. The compulsory hijab is not just a small piece of cloth for Iranian women; it is the most visible symbol of how we are oppressed by a tyrannical theocracy. Now, by drawing attention to that injustice, Mahsa’s death has the potential to serve as a new turning point for Iranian women.

They deserve the support of their Western counterparts. Yet so far we see little evidence that women in Europe or North America are willing to take to the streets to show their solidarity for a women’s revolution in Iran.

The true feminists and women’s rights activists are those in Afghanistan and Iran who are stepping forward, at great cost, to resist the Taliban and Islamic republic. They are the true feminist leaders of the 21st century, risking their lives by facing guns and bullets. They will go on fighting against the regimes, and we who have the privilege to live in free countries should actively amplify their voices. This is the moment for women in the West to stand with Iran’s mothers, daughters and sisters.

Don’t forget, too, that the U.S. is coddling Iran, dangling carrots to secure a false promise that the country won’t build nuclear weapons. Of course it will. We should not be acting as we have towards a country that violates human rights: not just against women, but against gays, non-Muslims, and atheists.

*There’s a parallel editorial in the NYT, which heartens me that the MSM really are cottoning on to the oppression in Iran: “Iran has lost sight of its greatest asset: women.” by Iranian-American Firoozeh Dumas.

The hijab has not always been a part of Iranian culture. Pictures of Tehran in the 1960s and ’70s show women wearing Jackie Kennedy-inspired dresses, short sleeves and miniskirts. But more important than their freedom to dress as they wished, Sedigeh’s generation witnessed the rise of women throughout Iranian society, in law, education and medicine, to name a few fields.

I have two posts on the change in dress since the Revolution, inspired simply by looking up Google images: see here and here. The NYT op-ed continues:

. . .When women are oppressed, no one wins. Iran today is full of educated, capable women who have risen to the top of their fields and whose bodies, paradoxically, are regulated by the government. Regardless of their education or contributions to society, outside their homes, every woman in Iran is at the mercy of the morality police. This is insulting, soul-crushing and not sustainable.

These brave, determined women marching in the streets want the chance to live unencumbered and to regain rights taken by a government that treats them as second-class citizens. Their level of determination, their hunger, can lead to great things. I have no doubt that Iranian women, if given the opportunity to fully become who they are meant to be, could be making even greater contributions to society that would benefit all Iranians. Instead, they are asking not to be killed for showing their hair.

That last sentence is so sad, and so true.

*What heartens me nearly as much is that many Iranian men are starting to show solidarity with the women. The fact is that most people in the country are fed up with the theocracy, forcing a vibrant country back to the middle ages. But here’s an example of the solidarity.  According to the Guardian, Iranian male soccer players are covering up their country’s emblems when playing matches overseas, expressing solidarity with the women protesting the murder of Mahsa Amini. (h/t Jez)

Iran’s players covered up their national symbols by wearing jackets before the friendly with Senegal on Tuesday evening, showing solidarity with protests against the repression of women in their home country.

The past 11 days have seen significant unrest in Iran after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, who had been arrested on 13 September for refusing to wear a hijab. There have been widespread protests and before their match in Maria Enzersdorf, a town just outside Vienna, the national team made their anger visible.

Carlos Queiroz’s team wore black jackets while the national anthems were played, concealing their country’s colours and badge. The match was played behind closed doors by edict of Iran’s football association, which held the rights to the fixture, but a sizeable number of demonstrators gathered outside in an effort to make their voices heard on television feeds.

On Sunday the influential Iran forward Sardar Azmoun had spoken out in support of the protests via his Instagram account. “At worst I’ll be dismissed from the national team,” wrote the Bayern Leverkusen player. “No problem. I’d sacrifice that for one hair on the heads of Iranian women. This story will not be deleted. They can do whatever they want. Shame on you for killing so easily; long live Iranian women.”

.Azmoun is a brave man, for he could face far more than just dismissal from the team. Here’s another player:

(From the Guardian): Iran’s forward Mehdi Taremi listens to the national anthem – all the Iran players wore black jackets which covered up the national team badge. Photograph: Jakub Sukup/AFP/Getty Images

*Remember that old fraud and spoon bender, Uri Geller? Well the WSJ reports that in 2009 he bought an island (a rock, really) off Scotland, created his own country (and selling citizenship for $1), and wants, most of all, the soccer team he’s creating.

Here’s his island

Several years ago, he bought a small rocky island lying off the town’s coast called the Lamb. The place is uninhabited, a wildlife reserve no larger than a soccer field and home to colonies of puffins, guillemots and other seabirds. Mr. Geller says he was drawn to it partly for his belief it might hold relics buried by a pharaoh’s daughter 3,500 years ago. He paid £30,000 for it when it came up for sale, though excavations are prohibited.

Now Mr. Geller is turning the Lamb into his own micronation, adding to a galaxy of imaginary countries, from old oil rigs to assorted backyards or bedrooms, jousting for international recognition.

He designed a flag, based on a design he thought up with Salvador Dali in the 1970s. He adopted an anthem and has drawn up a constitution professing peace and love for all mankind and extraterrestrials, too. Several celebrities have signed up, including singer Peter Andre and writer and TV personality Stephen Fry.

But what Mr. Geller really wants is a soccer team—and he will use his powers if it will help rack up a few wins.

North Berwick Amateurs captain Jack Fish looked up Mr. Geller’s email after the mother of a couple of the players read about his plans in the local paper, the East Lothian Courier. Mr. Fish fired off a proposal, thinking it could bring the team some publicity, like when the actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney bought the Welsh team Wrexham AFC two years ago.

. . . But in Scotland, Mr. Geller, now 75, is best known for a stunt in which he claims to have used his telekinetic powers to nudge the ball just as Scottish player Gary McAllister was taking a penalty kick against England in the 1996 European Championships. The ball went rocketing over the crossbar and England won the game. Mr. Geller was deluged with hate mail from north of the border.

In the future, he hopes the team will play against those of other micronations or in the Island Games, an annual tournament involving teams from places such as Greenland, the Faroe Islands and Gotland, in Sweden. Perhaps it could play in the World Cup one day, he muses.

Fat chance. But I like the title of the article, “Bend it like Geller: famous psychic turns his powers to a football team.”

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is in a mental recursion:

Hili: I’m contemplating.
A: Contemplating what?
Hili: Contemplating the mystery of contemplation.
In Polish:
Hili: Kontempluję.
Ja: Nad czym?
Hili: Nad misterium kontemplacji.

********************

From Divy: Hurricat classification:

From Malcolm: a sugar glider on Facebook:

Another church sign from David:

God retweets part of the notorious Stephen Fry interview:

Masih wants us to listen, so listen:

From Barry: A Republican Jesus:

From the Auschwitz Memorial: it’s the day of the Babi Yar massacre. There were 29 survivors.

Tweets from Matthew. First, one of his showing a beaver in VIENNA!

. . . and look at this foraging platypus!

Have you ever seen prettier clouds?:

Can you spot the dog? Yes, there is one here. I’ll put the answer below the fold:

Click “read more” to see the dog.

Did you spot the dog?  Here are two enlargements.

19 thoughts on “Thursday: Hili dialogue”

  1. CERN: there’s a Geneva city bus line which goes there. But just next to it is the French village of Ferney-Voltaire, where our friend Voltaire used to live. If the king sent his goons for Voltaire, he could just nip over the border for safety.

    Reply

    1. It‘s even better now. There is s streetcar line running from Geneva‘s central train station Cornavin to the CERN gates.

      Reply

    1. So apply this to fruit instead of coffee and the sentiment is the same: Samuel Johnson said, about strawberries, that doubtless God could have made a better berry but doubtless he did not. Johnson was not a nature lover though; he said he hated going out into the countryside because the air was full of so many uncooked birds.

      Reply

  3. Pretty sure that tune is a jazz standard. Very fine – but notice how rich and far-ranging it is in contrast to modern tunes, which have a possibly nice melody but never leaves its happy little sonic puddle.

    Disturbing, to modern young audiences perhaps. Or boring.

    Reply

  4. Now Mr. Geller is turning the Lamb into his own micronation … He designed a flag, based on a design he thought up with Salvador Dali in the 1970s. He adopted an anthem and has drawn up a constitution professing peace and love for all mankind and extraterrestrials, too. Several celebrities have signed up, including …Stephen Fry.

    I like to imagine that Fry has bought many of these citizenship applications as birthday gifts for special friends and enemies.

    Reply

  8. Not on any Hili dialogue topics but apropos for this website, the NYT has an interesting article on the evolution of jaws and teeth. This article is why I keep coming back to the NYT despite its distressing wokeness and I thought other WEIT readers would be interested. It is facinating and well done (IMO).

    A well put “money” quote from the article, an aside when discussing cartilaginous fish; “Bony fish like salmon and humans are the other branch”.

    Hat tip to Neil Shubin? Anyway, if you haven’t seen it, I hope you enjoy it too.

    Reply

  12. “The history of the region is so complicated that I won’t even begin to recount it, but here’s the declaration itself and “Mandatory Palestine” in 1946, before the division into Israel and the Palestinian territories. Back then the area did extend “from the [Jordan] river to the sea.”

    It is my understanding that that area (Israel) still extends from river to sea. The borders of Mandatory Palestine became the borders of the new nation of Israel on May 14, 1948 at the instant that Israel declared its independence, due to the application of the universally-applied principle of International law known as uti possidetis juris.

    The UN does not recognize the valid possession of territory taken by a war of aggression. Jordan did not legally occupy Judea and Samaria from 1948 – 1967. Israel’s borders therefore remain essentially those of Mandatory Palestine, and can only be changed by treaty, as has been done with Gaza. The Oslo accords do not represent a change in territory of Israel, only a change of the administration of defined areas within what Israel calls “disputed territories”, territories Israel has always quietly maintained are within its still-legal 1948 borders.

    So while there is a (propaganda) movement to label Judea and Samaria (the so-called “West Bank”) as “Palestinian territories”, they still belong to Israel. If they were, in fact, true Palestinian territories, the Palestinians would indeed have their own state, which they do not.

    The Palestinians can’t just declare sovereignty over territory which belongs to another state because they claim it is somehow rightfully theirs. Indeed, the ‘right of self-determination for Palestinian Arabs in Palestine’ was the exact same rationale used for the creation of Trans-Jordan in 3/4ths of the territory of Mandate Palestine 100 years ago. 99% of the original citizens of Trans-Jordan were Palestinian and Levantine Arabs.

    Reply

  13. That GOP Jesus was hilarious and sad and true.

    Where’s that beaver going to find trees / food? Maybe it can eat the vegetation…strange place for a beaver, I must say.

    Reply

  14. “The true feminists and women’s rights activists are those in Afghanistan and Iran who are stepping forward, at great cost, to resist the Taliban and Islamic republic. They are the true feminist leaders of the 21st century, risking their lives by facing guns and bullets. They will go on fighting against the regimes, and we who have the privilege to live in free countries should actively amplify their voices. This is the moment for women in the West to stand with Iran’s mothers, daughters and sisters.”
    You can say that again, they should but they won’t. Way too many Western ‘intersectional’ feminists and Woke pay fealty to fundamentalist Islam (just think of Sasour and her ilk)

    Reply

  15. Then think of all the drinks BETTER than coffee that don’t exist because the plants never evolved.”

    Mind blown! (And a little disappointed.)

    Reply

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