Wednesday: Hili dialogue

July 31, 2024 • 6:45 am

Welcome to a Hump Day (“Umusi w’Ikigobe” in Rundi): Wednesday, July 31, 2024, with August coming on fast. It’s also National Avocado Day, and all the cool kids are eating avocado toast. But the people with taste will be thinking of guacamole. Here’s one recipe (I like to cover mine with a thin layer of good mayo, which not only prevents it from browning but also, when mixed in, improves the flavor:

It’s also National Raspberry Cake Day, National Cotton Candy Day, Shredded Wheat Day, and National Mutt Day. 

There’s another Google Doodle honoring the Olympics, this one going to a game in which you click on figures that you think are most emblematic of the Olympics.

One of the many tableaux, which looks suspicious to me, but maybe I’m just paranoid:

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the July 26 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Obituaries first. Unless you’re of a certain age, you won’t remember William Calley, infamous for his murderous behavior during the Vietnam War.  He got off very lightly, but of course nobody’s immortal, and Calley just died at 80.

William Laws Calley Jr., who as an Army lieutenant led the U.S. soldiers who killed hundreds of Vietnamese civilians in the My Lai massacre, the most notorious war crime in modern American military history, has died. He was 80.

Calley died on April 28, according to his Florida death record, which said he had been living in an apartment in Gainesville. His death was first reported by The Washington Post on Monday, citing his death certificate.

Calley had lived in obscurity in the decades since he was court-martialed and convicted in 1971, the only one of 25 men originally charged to be found guilty in the massacre, which helped turn American opinion against the war in Vietnam.

On March 16, 1968, Calley led American soldiers of the Charlie Company on a mission to confront a crack outfit of their Vietcong enemies. Instead, over several hours, the soldiers killed 504 unresisting civilians, mostly women, children and elderly men, in My Lai and a neighboring community.

The men were angry: Two days earlier, a booby trap had killed a sergeant, blinded a GI and wounded several others while Charlie Company was on patrol.

Soldiers eventually testified to the U.S. Army investigating commission that the murders began soon after Calley led Charlie Company’s first platoon into My Lai that morning. Some were bayoneted to death. Families were herded into bomb shelters and killed with hand grenades. Other civilians slaughtered in a drainage ditch. Women and girls were gang-raped.

It wasn’t until more than a year later that news of the massacre became public. And while the My Lai massacre was the most notorious massacre in modern U.S. military history, it was not an aberration: Estimates of civilians killed during the U.S. ground war in Vietnam from 1965 to 1973 range from 1 million to 2 million.

The U.S. military’s own records, filed away for three decades, described 300 other cases of what could fairly be described as war crimes. My Lai stood out because of the shocking one-day death toll, stomach-churning photographs and the gruesome details exposed by a high-level U.S. Army inquiry.

Calley was tried for murder in 1970, took the stand in his own defense, said that he thought he was supposed to kill everyone, and showed no remorse.  He was convicted of premeditated murder of 22 civilians, and sentenced to life imprisonment, but what happened to him? Almost nothing: his sentence was reduced after several appeals, and he spent just three days in prison (thanks to Richard Nixon) and then three years of house arrest. He worked at a jewelry store for a while, got married and divorced, got a real-estate license, and then he died. He finally apologized for his role, but the punishment never fit the crime. Here’s his mug shot from Wikipedia (if you want to see a grim photo of some of the civilians murdered by his men, go here).

Photographer unknown; in public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

*I woke up this morning to find that Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of Hamas who had been comfortably domiciled in Qatar, was killed while visiting Tehran for the inauguration of Iran’s new President. He was 62. This is a huge deal, not only showing that Israeli intelligence (who else could have done it?) is back on the beam, but that it can reach into Iran to wipe out Hamas. From the NYT:

Ismail Haniyeh, one of the most senior Hamas leaders, was assassinated in Iran, the country’s Revolutionary Guards Corps and Hamas said on Wednesday, a severe blow to the Palestinian group that threatens to engulf the region in further conflict.

Both Iran and Hamas accused Israel of killing Mr. Haniyeh, who led the group’s political operations from exile in Qatar. He was in Tehran to attend the inauguration of the newly elected president of Iran, Hamas’s main backer.

Hours before the assassination, Israel said it had struck Fuad Shukr, a senior member of Hezbollah, a Lebanese militia that is also backed by Iran and has been fighting a low-level war with Israel since October. The two strikes have suddenly shifted the calculus in the Middle East, after a month in which Israel and Hamas had appeared to edge closer to a cease-fire in Gaza. Such a deal was expected to lead to a truce between Israel and Hezbollah.

Now, the focus is on how Hamas and Hezbollah will respond to the attacks on their leaders; how Iran will react to a strike on its territory; and whether either reaction leads to the outbreak of a wider regional war. An Israeli strike on Iranian commanders in Syria in April led Iran to fire hundreds of missiles at Israel. Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Haniyeh’s assassination would prompt a “harsh punishment.”

Mr. Haniyeh was a key figure in Hamas’s cease-fire negotiations with Israel, and his assassination makes the prospects for a deal even more unclear.

Israel’s military has not commented on his death and said it does not respond to reports in the foreign news media. In recent years it has carried out a number of high-profile assassinations in Iran, rattling the country’s leaders and prompting a security overhaul including the ouster of a top security official.

. . . . Hours after Haniyeh’s death, Israeli leaders have mostly yet to comment on the Hamas leader’s assassination in Tehran. Touring Israeli air defense batteries on Wednesday, Israel’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant, said: “We don’t want war, but we are preparing for every eventuality.”

Of course the whole world is not tut-tutting, cautioning Israel about fomenting a “wider war”, but in fact Israel is doing exactly what the whole world has approved: getting rid of Hamas; and there’s no bigger target than Haniyeh save Yahya Sinwar, the military leader of Hamas who, presumably, is hiding in the tunnels under Gaza.  People like Blinken are still calling for a ceasefire, apparently unaware that a permanent cessation of hostilities in Gaza now will ensure a Hamas victory, regardless of Haniyeh, and the continuation of terrorism directed at Israel.

*Israel has begun its big-time retaliation at Hezbollah for killing 12 Israeli kids on a soccer pitch. It has in fact precision-bombed Beirut.

The Israeli military said it launched a strike in Beirut targeting a Hezbollah commander it said was behind an attack in the Israel-controlled Golan Heights on Saturday that killed 12 children—raising the risk of a full-scale war.

A loud explosion was heard in Beirut’s Haret Hreik neighborhood, which turned out to be an airstrike, according to Lebanon’s official National News Agency. The sound of sirens wailing could be heard miles away from the blast.

The Israeli military called the attack “a targeted strike in Beirut, on the commander responsible for the murder of the children” in the Golan Heights and other Israeli civilians.

The strike was the second time in nine months of war that Israel has struck Beirut. An Israeli airstrike also killed a senior Hamas leader in the Lebanese capital in January.

“Hezbollah crossed a red line,” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant posted on X shortly after the strike.

And from the NYT:

The target of the strike was Fuad Shukr, a senior Hezbollah official, who served as a close adviser to Hassan Nasrallah, the secretary general of the powerful Lebanese Shiite militant group, according to three Israeli security officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details of the operation.

In a post on X, Yoav Gallant, Israel’s defense minister, said Hezbollah had “crossed a red line.”

Hanin Ghaddar, an expert on Lebanese affairs, said that Mr. Shukr was a powerful military figure within Hezbollah who was a key figure in Hezbollah operations in the south of Lebanon.

. . . . “He’s a very big target,” said Mr. Ghaddar, a senior fellow at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy in Washington.

UPDATE: The IDF reports (don’t ask me how they know these things) that Fuad Shukr was indeed killed in the targeted strike. 

According to Israel, the strike targeted and killed Fuad Shukr, the top military commander for the Hezbollah terror group. The IDF says Shukr masterminded months of cross-border attacks that killed over 3 dozen people in Israel, including Saturday’s strike in Majdal Shams that left 12 youths dead.

And some members of Congress thanked Israel for this, as Shukr was responsible for the deaths of several hundred American soldiers in 1983:

Members of Congress were among those who thanked Israel for killing senior Hezbollah commander Fu’ad Shukr, who was responsible for the recent attack that killed 12 children in Majdal Shams and for planning the 1983 bombing of a U.S. Marine Corps barracks in Beirut that killed 241 American soldiers.

I don’t think this is the end of Israel’s retaliation, but if it invades Lebanon, well, they have all those missiles and the backing of Iran. I sure wouldn’t want to be head of the IDF, much less the Prime Minister, now.  There is no response that won’t have bad side effects. Will they be satisfied with the death of Shukr. Well, the head of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, is still alive, no doubt hiding in one of Hezbollah’s many tunnels. He’s the man Israel wants to get.

*I’m sure you’re wondering, “Well, what about those Presidential debates? What happens now?” The answer is that it’s all fouled up:

Kamala Harris is ready to debate Donald Trump. He is ready to debate her. And just about every TV network wants in on the action.

Yet, with less than 100 days to go before voters go to the polls, absolutely nothing is set, with the Trump campaign waffling on an ABC debate scheduled for Sept. 10—the only one currently on the schedule—and the possibility that other face-offs will be added to the calendar.

NBC News is in talks with each campaign about adding a debate, while CBS News also has a proposal in, said people familiar with the situation. Fox News last week proposed a Sept. 17 debate.

Since 1988, presidential nominees have faced off in several debates organized by the third-party Commission on Presidential Debates. President Biden and Trump dispensed with the commission, agreeing to come up with their own rules, including for the June 27 debate on CNN that sent Biden’s campaign on a downward spiral.

Harris’s entry in the race—marked by a stunningly quick consolidation of support among Democrats and polls showing she has narrowed the gap with Trump—has upended those plans, leading to unusually chaotic negotiations.

Trump has sent mixed signals about debating Harris, with his campaign saying last week he wanted to wait to make sure Harris is really the nominee, and the candidate saying he would like to debate on Fox News rather than ABC.

Well one thing is for sure: Harris will do a better job than will Biden against Trump. And another thing is that Trump is less likely to win if he fails to have a debate. The American people need one, and Trump would look like a coward. On the other hand, Harris has never done very well in unscripted debates, as she just doesn’t think very clearly and tends to answer questions with either a rephrased version of the question or with a word salad.  But certainly a debate would be both enlightening and amusing, and I’d like to see Harris deal with some questions about her rapid pivots in the last few years (her latest is her new approval of fracking since she needs to win Pennsylvania). Trump—well, he just lies and coats the lies with a healthy dose of narcissism.

*This is heartening, and a great comeback for the Olympics’ most-watched athlete:

At the very end of Tuesday’s team final at the Paris Games, even before Simone Biles had finished her dangerously difficult floor routine and the crowd roared in appreciation of the most decorated U.S. Olympic gymnast in history, the U.S. team knew that it had accomplished what it came here for.

And that was to reclaim the title of Olympic champion.

Led by Biles and the defending all-around champion, Sunisa Lee, the United States won the gold medal with a dominant performance of 171.296 points, finishing ahead of second-place Italy by almost 6 points. Brazil won the bronze.

Three years ago in Tokyo, the U.S. team won silver, behind the Russian team, after Biles withdrew from the event because of a mental block that made her disoriented in the air. It was the first time that the Americans didn’t finish in first place since 2008, when they won silver at the Beijing Games.

Other Olympic news from yesterday. From NBC News:

 

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*I find that novels that win the UK’s Booker Prize are better than those winning America’s Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and here we have a whole batch of Booker Prize finalists, with the bulk of them being by Americans!  Here, then, is a spate of books you may want to investigate:

Six novels by U.S. authors, including Percival Everett, Rachel Kushner and Richard Powers, are among the 13 titles nominated for this year’s Booker Prize, the award’s organizers announced on Tuesday.

Everett’s book “James” is a retelling of Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn” from the perspective of an enslaved runaway; Kushner’s “Creation Lake,” is a forthcoming novel about a spy who infiltrates an environmental activist group; and Powers’s “Playground,” another forthcoming title, imagines a plan to send floating cities into the Pacific Ocean.

The Booker Prize is one of the most coveted literary awards, given each year to a novel written in English and published in Britain or Ireland. Recent winners include Margaret Atwood’s “The Testaments” and Douglas Stuart’s “Shuggie Bain.” Last year’s winner was “Prophet Song,” a novel by Paul Lynch set in a near-future Ireland torn apart by civil war.

Founded in 1969, the Booker Prize was for most of its life only open to books by writers from Britain, Ireland, the Commonwealth and Zimbabwe, but in 2014, organizers expanded its eligibility criteria to any work written in English. Ever since, British literary figures have regularly complained about the prize’s dominance by American authors.

Tuesday’s announcement could reignite those concerns, especially because only two novels by British authors have been nominated: Samantha Harvey’s “Orbital,” a day-in-the-life story of six astronauts circling the earth on a space station; and Sarah Perry’s “Enlightenment,” about unrequited love in an English town.

As well as the books by Everett, Kushner and Powers, the three other American novels nominated are Rita Bullwinkel’s “Headshot,” set in a women’s boxing tournament; Claire Messud’s “This Strange Eventful History,” a family saga that explores France’s colonial history; and “Wandering Stars,” by Tommy Orange, which is about the impact of colonization on a Native American family.

Orange is the Booker Prize’s first ever Native American nominee.

Given that there are far more American authors than UK authors as a matter of simple population size, and assuming the mean quality is about the same, it’s not surprising that in the upper tail you’re going to find more American authors. Brits shouldn’t beef unless they think the prize should be specifically awarded to authors from the UK. You can find the Booker “longlist” here.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is contentious, and Malgorzata explains: “Hili thinks that she is much wiser than Szaron and she cannot entertain the idea of agreeing with something Szaron thought out for himself.”

Szaron: You will agree, my dear…
Hili: I will not.
Szaron: But you don’t know what I mean.
Hili: It doesn’t matter at all.
In Polish:
Szaron: Przyznasz moja droga…
Hili: Nie przyznam.
Szaron: Przecież nie wiesz o co mi chodzi.
Hili: To nie ma żadnego znaczenia.

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

From Cat Memes:

From Strange, Stupid or Silly Signs via Jacob Hall:

From The Darwin Awards Funny Official 2024 via Ahmed Sufuilla:

Another Iranian woman blinded by the authorities for protesting:

Good news from Le Peenqua:

From my feed: live and learn:

From Bryan, another post put up by Massimo, but very different from the one above:

From Malcolm, a very nice cat:

From the Auschwitz Memorial, one I retweeted:

Two tweets from Dr. Cobb. The first is the winner of Best Cat Video from the Olympics:

This is a good story; read the thread to see the rest:

36 thoughts on “Wednesday: Hili dialogue”

    1. I might be wrong, but I think that I recall they did last year. If not: yes well past time.

      1. I checked Wikipedia and they seem to say that over the years a compromise had his medals restored but with him sharing the victories, but that finally in 2022, the IOC fully restored Thorpe’s position as the lone victor along with his medals. Or at least so says Wikipedia. I did not check their primary source references.

          1. I think you are right. Something I noticed because of my lifelong knowledge of himgetting screwed….and my inherent general dislike ofathletic organization bureaucrats, ioc, aau, and ncaa.

  2. Gonna try that mayo idea — trust me, I have tried many MANY ways to keep that guac poppin’.

    … maybe vinegar, but let’s not get nuts yet…

    … and just occurred to me : the Dr. Who perspective painting would be in 3D – but important to note, here we look at it in 2D with two eyes. Not sure of the consequence there.

    One eye viewing in generally more accurate for 2D images, but you know..

      1. It’s OK – tried crystalline citric acid too.

        Tried keeping whole avocado slices in tomato as well. Not so OK.

        1. Avocado just really doesn’t last well no matter what you do. Storage usually isn’t a problem for me when I make guacamole. Average time from the bowl hitting the table to empty, maybe 10 minutes.

          But sometimes I do like to make it a little before hand. The only somewhat effective way I’ve tried to keep the top from turning is to smooth out the top and then lay plastic wrap over it, in direct contact with the guacamole, much like a phone screen protector, removing all the air starting from the center out to the sides of the bowl. You lose a bit when you peel it off, but it works pretty well.

          1. Guacamole freezes exceptionally well. When avos go on sale for less than a dollar I’ll buy 20 or so and make a guac batch that lasts many months. The key is to not add extra liquid or vegies. Just avocado, garlic, maybe some dried chilies and salt. It freezes beautifully. And if you like to add tomatoes, fresh chilies, cilantro, lime, etc, go for it after you thaw out a batch of the “guacamole mother.”

            And I agree with your method of preservation once thawed or made fresh. Keep a layer of plastic wrap tight upon the top to stop oxidation.

  3. The Booker should have remained a Commonwealth, Ireland, etc. prize. The whole point was to give exposure to authors in smaller English speaking countries who get swamped by the American cultural juggernaut.

    1. Agree. There is now no UK literary prize equivalent to, say, the Pulitzer, which is open to US writers only (I think?) The Booker is also open to anyone else writing in English, which includes not only Commonwealth citizens but, this year, a novelist of Libyan origin.

    2. I just spent a couple minutes looking up the sequence of names for the Booker. In particular, I had finally gotten used to hearing “the Man Booker Prize” and was a little surprised that was gone. Indeed, that was the name only during 2002-2019 (unless I am making off-by-one errors from the description below).

      From Britannica: “The Booker Prize was administered by the Book Trust until 2002, when oversight passed to the Man Group PLC, an investment management firm. At this time the award was renamed the Man Booker Prize. In 2019 the prize reverted to its original name after the charitable foundation Crankstart became the sponsor.”

  4. It was the women rugby sevens U.S.A team that earned the bronze on a spectacular last few seconds try. I first saw rugby sevens last Olympics and really enjoy it as perhaps my favorite of that type of team sport. I wish it had been widely available in the U.S. in my teenage years of the 60’s because I surely would have played. Because players seem to always be moving in the same direction, the hugely dangerous and energetic opposing collisions of American football are avoided. I also like that the “extra points” are taken from the lateral position where the score (try) was achieved. If lacrosse and now maybe even cricket become ubiquitous, surely we can support rugby sevens with its limited equipment requirements.

    And to balance things out: what on Earth does 3×3 basketball bring to the table? And breakdancing? Jeebus!

    1. +1

      Emphasis on the participation here – not the spectator sport angle – yes, less brain case abuse. Wonder how many players would leave football.

      I made two good “sticks” and said to myself “ok, I am satisfied with that tiny story I can tell now – time to let football go.”

    2. I’m undecided on whether or not I think the Olympics is a good fit venue for it, but breakdancing is very athletic. In the same ways that sports like gymnastics are.

    3. I always very much like to watch rugby when I get to watch it, which is rarely. It seems rougher than American football.

      1. I had to play a few minutes of rugby as a kid because the school which I attended was known for it and encouraged participation, even at the lowest level — the lowest level of rugby was the in which I stood any chance. So I was thrust into the field of play in a house match. I managed to get hold of the ball (don’t quite remember how) only to be picked up and dumped into the ground by a boy of considerable size and strength. I picked myself up and later tried to tackle someone (maybe the same chap) but did not make much difference to his rapid progress. He scored and I was politely withdrawn by the coach. I was happy to spend the rest of my school days being bad at cricket.

      2. Quite a bit rougher. My mother got my Dad to quit his amateur league team after one of his team-mates came off the field with two broken arms.

        1. If he broke his arms on two separate plays some time apart, I would be especially impressed!

      3. It is indeed potentially dangerous. The governing authorities are continually trying to find ways of making it safer (eg by outlawing high tackles) without compromising its basic principles and attraction. Several former players now appear to have long-term brain trauma, and there is possibly a class action pending in the UK.

        That said, it can be a wonderful sport to watch. My wife and I are season ticket holders at Harlequins, based in West London, and some of the matches we have watched over the past dozen years or so have been breathtaking. Their stadium has a capacity of only 12,800, and it is always full. The atmosphere knocks any humdrum religious assembly into a cocked hat!

  5. “Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Haniyeh’s assassination would prompt a “harsh punishment.”

    Is anyone out there waiting with bated breath for the world to call upon Iran and Hamas to “exercise restraint”?

    L

  7. Sounds like the assassination in Iran was up close, in contrast to the one in Beirut. That should really rattle the leadership there, and energize the internal resistance.

    Otherwise, a good friend who served as a SeaBee in Viet Nam told me yesterday how much he hated Calley. Why? Because he and the massacre were more than anything responsible for the reception those returning from Viet Nam received. Astonishing that his demise went un-noticed for three months, too.

    1. There is still far too much hero worship of military veterans in the US. It would be better if more people cared about the bombing of Cambodia or the millions of people who fled their homes thanks to America’s War on Terror.

  8. Oh I’m utterly convinced they’ve known where Nasrallah is at nearly all times. They keep him alive though b/c who’d come next could probably be worse. There’s precedent for this – the Brits had a bead on Hitler but didn’t shoot b/c he was doing such a bad job (this, from memory, in about 1943 at the Eagle’s Nest and earlier on a parade). (Check the details I’m no ww2 buff.)

    Also…. to take out such a big player in Lebanon might cause a mass uprising on Hezb’s side and a larger war. He is, after all, Lebanese, and Hezb is a party which controls about 1/4 of the seats in parliament.

    Better to just gradually degrade Hezb, vivisect it, as it were. Lately a lot of Hezbs have been whacked going all the way back to Imad Mugnieh (of TWA fame) whose Subaru headrest exploded – all of a sudden like – after a party in Damascus about a decade ago. Hate when that happens. 🙂

    This latest Hanniyeh whacking exhibits high style and sublime artistry. In Tehran: chef’s kiss.

    Onwards Israeli heroes.

    D.A.
    NYC
    for more of my loud mouth: https://themoderatevoice.com/author/david-anderson/

  9. Israel’s two latest assassinations demonstrate the reach of Israeli intelligence and of the IDF—directly into the capitals of Lebanon and Iran. Iran will almost certainly retaliate, both via Hezbollah and perhaps from Iran itself. Turkey’s President Erdoğan has also threatened to get involved if Israel attacks in Lebanon, which it has. My sincere hope is that these assassinations were done with the awareness and tacit approval of the U.S. The situation seems to be at a critical point right now. The threat of expansion into a hot regional war is high and Israel will be in terrible danger if Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, and Turkey all decide to attack. U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said yesterday that the U.S. would support Israel in case of attack by Hezbollah, so I infer (and hope) that the same would be the case if Iran joined the fray. The U.S. wants to avoid *direct* involvement, but the situation risks becoming a hot mess.

  11. Odd fruit market picture. I’ve never seen cut watermelon at one, unless it was wrapped in saran wrap and kept on ice.

  12. Liked the Google Doodle which seemed to fit in most sports, even surfing in Tahiti, but while the artist was capable of drawing dogs and a few birds, they must have been incapable of drawing horses or Versailles.

  13. “It [the 2020 Olympics] was the first time that the Americans didn’t finish in first place since 2008, when they won silver at the Beijing Games.”

    Yes, yes, it’s twelve years from 2008 to 2020. The above is (more than) a bit of bloviation which would be more tolerable to the eye and ear were the Olympics held every year. There were only two Olympics between 2008 and 2020.

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