Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
Good morning on the shabbos for cats: it’s CaturSaturday, September 14, 2024, and it’s National Eat a Hoagie Day. (If you’re not American, hoagies are also known as “subs”, “submarine sandwiches,” or, in New England, “grinders.”) Here’s a salami, ham, and cheese hoagie from Wikipedia. The dressing is superfluous.
*For all intents and purposes, the war between Hamas and Israel is over, as the IDF has declared that the Rafah Brigade has been defeated and, importantly, all the tunnels from Egypt into Gaza—tunnels critical for bringing weapons to Hamas—have also been destroyed.
From the first link (I’ll be pedantic in noting the new but faulty usage of the word “decimated”, which originally meant “selecting and killing one out of every ten people”, not the present construal as “destroyed”):
The Hamas terror group’s Rafah Brigade has been decimated, at least 2,308 of its operatives have been killed by the Israel Defense Forces, and over 13 kilometers (8 miles) worth of tunnels have been destroyed, military officials told reporters in the Gaza Strip’s southernmost city on Thursday.
Now, as the IDF maintains control of the entire city and the border area with Egypt, known as the Philadelphi Corridor, combat engineers are completing their investigations of a few dozen Hamas tunnels that have not yet been demolished, an operation that will not take longer than a few weeks.
With seemingly no hostage deal with the terror group on the horizon — under which the IDF would likely have to withdraw from the Gaza Strip, including the Philadelphi Corridor — it currently remains unclear what the IDF will do in Rafah once the last tunnel is destroyed.
Senior military officials said they would carry out whatever missions the political echelon eventually orders them to complete.
“The Rafah Brigade has been defeated,” Brig. Gen. Itzik Cohen, the general in charge of the offensive in the city, told reporters at the Philadelphi Corridor. “Their four battalions have been destroyed, and we have completed operational control over the entire urban area.”
And from the second, earlier link:
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Wednesday revealed a document he said was written by the former commander of Hamas’s Khan Younis Brigade in southern Gaza, Rafa’a Salameh, and addressed to Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and his brother Muhammad, in which the commander described the “difficult situation” in which the terror group had found itself.
Salameh, a mastermind of the terror group’s October 7 massacre, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in southern Gaza in July that also killed senior Hamas commander Muhammad Deif.
In the letter, he wrote: “Please consider the following: We maintain the remaining weapons and equipment, as we have lost 90-95 percent of our rocket capabilities; and we have lost some 60% of our personal weapons; we have lost at least 65-70% of our anti-tank launchers and rockets,” according to excerpts provided and translated by the Defense Ministry.
“Most importantly,” he continued, “we have lost at least 50% of our fighters between those who are martyred and wounded, and now we are left with 25%. The last 25% of our people have reached a situation where the people do not tolerate them anymore, broken on a mental or physical level.”
Gallant said the document showed “a real hardship that affects Hamas and affects the most senior commanders.”
Israel has won the war, or at least achieved its aim of defeating Hamas. But two questions arise. The most important is: “What next?”. Who is going to rule Gaza? I expect that Israel will maintain a military presence there, which of course will not bring harmony between Jews and Arabs, but may be necessary—and for a long time. The real long-term solution rests on creating two states, but I can’t envision that for years to come. There are no Palestinians capable of ruling such a state without promulgating terrorism, and no Israelis want a terror state next door.
The second is “Will this stop the anti-Israel protests?” And the answer is certainly not: the protestors with keffiyehs (once defined as “swastikas for hipsters”) will just be more enraged that Hamas has become defanged, and of course the aim to destroy the state of Israel will remain, even if protests have no effect. In fact, Hamas’s loss may turn world sentiment even further against Israel, because, as Douglas Murray always says, “Israel is the one country in the world that isn’t allowed to win a war.”
*Nellie Bowles is back writing her regular Friday news summaries on The Free Press. Her latest piece is called “TGIF: Concepts of a plan” (remember that phrase from the debate?), and I’ll steal three items from the summary. I won’t repeat her very long take on the debate, which of course is the truth: Trump was demolished. Here are three shorter pieces:
→ Not Laura Loomer: Trump’s entourage is always a rogue’s gallery. But for now I’ll highlight Laura Loomer, a conspiracy-minded conservative influencer, who is traveling with the former president. She says that 9/11 was an inside job, naturally. And here’s what she wrote about Kamala Harris this week. The first item is unbelievable.
Marjorie Taylor Greene—she of “Jewish space lasers” notoriety—said this of Loomer’s tweet: “This is appalling and extremely racist. It does not represent who we are as Republicans or MAGA. This does not represent President Trump. This type of behavior should not be tolerated ever.”
→ Waymo is a miracle: In other pro-tech takes, three cheers for Waymo, the driverless car company. They just released data on their journeys in Phoenix and San Francisco. How’s it been going? Very, very well. “Waymo vehicles get into injury-causing crashes less than one-third as often, per mile, as human-driven vehicles,” writes Timothy Lee, who has a great newsletter about AI. “Out of the 23 most serious Waymo crashes, 16 involved a human driver rear-ending a Waymo. Three others involved a human-driven car running a red light before hitting a Waymo. There were no serious crashes where a Waymo ran a red light, rear-ended another car, or engaged in other clear-cut misbehavior.” I’ll say it: As a busy mom of two, and as a woman, this thing drives way better than me.
Media coverage obsesses over every error a self-driving car makes. And rightly so, to some extent (we cover the planes that crash). But humans are horrible drivers. Think about the people you see wandering around the streets. Honestly, even think about your various family members. Really think about them. I’m not naming names (Mom) or incidents (parking lot of the drugstore, Exit 32, over Christmas ’98) but really consider it. Should the people you know and love (and appreciate!) helm a two-ton machine screeching through the world at 85 mph? Probably not.
Well, there aren’t many items this week but I extracted this from her account of the debate. I think I posted before about this issue, which shows you that I’m ahead of the curve:
→ One interesting turn is that some of the wackiest progressive policies, policies that Kamala Harris heartily endorsed in a more exciting era, now come across as crazy and bizarre to even ask about. When Trump said that Kamala Harris “wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison,” he was saying something that is quite literally true (here’s the CNN story on that exact position of hers). But it soundscrazy. And Kamala reacted as if it was crazy (“What is he talking about?” she said, smiling toward the audience). Trans aliens [JAC: immigrants, not Martians] became a meme with BuzzFeed’s headline: “Donald Trump Might Have Said One Of The Most Baffling Things Of His Career In The Debate, And The Internet Is Having A Field Day.” But. . . but. . . she did support that! No, the media says now; no, she did not. Here’s the stately New Yorker with their political analysis of the debate: “His line about how the Vice-President ‘wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison’ was pretty memorable, too. What the hell was he talking about?” We have all been normal moderates all this time, silly goose. What are you even talking about? <Hides the incarcerated and medically transitioned illegal aliens under the bed>
On Tuesday night, Sept. 3, Ilya Bratman—U.S. Army veteran, CUNY English teacher, and Hillel executive director at eight CUNY and SUNY schools—hosted a welcome-back dinner for Hillel students at a kosher restaurant near Baruch College. Soon after their entrance into Mr. Broadway, guests were surrounded by a chanting, braying, mob.
“CUNY, CUNY, You can’t hide. You support genocide!”
“Terrorist! Terrorist! Terrorist!”
“All Zionists are racist!”
They blocked the doorway, preventing students and other diners from leaving, held photos of murdered babies in the students’ faces, and even hit a Hillel staffer. One of the male protesters, his face concealed by a mask, shoulders draped in a kaffiyeh, creepily formed his fingers in the shape of a triangle—Hamas’ symbol for a military target.
Then the slurs got personal. To a clearly Jewish-looking couple walking down the street, “You ugly ass bitch! Go back to Brooklyn!”
And, then, the kicker: “Where’s Hersh?”
For an hour.
When the cops arrived after 30 minutes of the melee, they moved the protesters “5 feet away” from the entrance, according to Bratman, placing them close to the restaurant windows, which they then hammered with their hands. There was nothing they wouldn’t say, from “You ain’t going home tonight,” to “Dogs off campus.”
. . . “What’s new about this round of protests?” I asked Bratman. To propose a story to my editor, I’ll have to say what’s new. Bratman just about lost it. “Protesters stalked, menaced, harassed, and followed Jewish students to a kosher restaurant, like they would have done on Nov. 9, 1938, and blocked the entrance, screamed obscenities, and banged on windows calling for violence against Jews,” he told me. “They not only terrorized students, but also other Jews, random New York Jews having dinner. The cops came, didn’t do anything, even though they heard distinct, specific threats against the lives of the Jews inside.”
What’s going on at CUNY is unbelievable, and I don’t have the space to recount how the administration really does seem hell-bent at driving out the school’s Jews., but the details are in the piece. Here’s one conclusion:
But the more fundamental problem at CUNY, Bratman pointed out, is that the basic job of educating children has been abandoned. “Academia has been lost,” he said. “The essence of academia—open discourse, civil dialogue, and academic excellence—is gone. Academia used to be about growth, research, exploration, discovery, openness. Now it’s about boycotts. Today, the teachers believe their job is indoctrination.”
*Let’s have a look at Andrew Sullivan’s take on the debate in his new column “The things she didn’t say.” First Sullivan gives quotes about Trump’s 2016 debate with Hillary Clinton, but substitutes “Harris” for “Clinton”, showing that Trump also lost every debate with Clinton, but nevertheless, well, still won the Presidency. While Sullivan is a never-Trumper, he still criticizes Harris, and the Harris-lovers here will not be happy:
I mention the 2016 debate example not because the debate this week is destined to be as irrelevant as it was eight years ago. Who knows? I mention it because Trump has never been a good debater — that requires logic and evidence, not stream-of-consciousness insanity. And Clinton’s serial devastation of Trump could not overcome her deeper vulnerabilities: her weakness among the white working class, her polarizing decades in public life, and her inability to grasp the salience of mass immigration and free trade.
To my mind, Harris has three bigger policy vulnerabilities as an actual incumbent: she presided over a collapse of the southern border, admitting millions of illegal immigrants, almost all of whom will never leave; she was in power when we had a spike in inflation worse than anything since the 1970s; and, unlike Clinton or Biden, she has a political record on the far left. On Tuesday, for all her debating chops, she did nothing to dispel public worries about all three.
Yes, she focused on Trump, making him the star of the show in many ways. But was he revealed as something different than we’ve seen in the past? Not so much. This was classic Trump. Exposing him this way has never worked before. Most people responded to some of his cray-cray by bursting out laughing.
And the focus on Trump took attention away from Harris. And she needs that attention. She needed those 90 minutes to rebut the critiques of her past opportunism, to introduce herself clearly, to spell out how she will grow the economy, keep inflation under control and stop illegal immigration. And, by and large, she failed.
She dodged question after question with scant follow-up. On the single area she was pressed, fracking, she had a chance to explain why she had said, in 2019, “There’s no question I’m in favor of banning fracking, and starting with what we can do on Day 1 around public lands” — about as definitive a statement as it is possible to make — only to reverse herself when she became the veep nominee. The honest answer for the change is that Biden forced it. A good answer would be that she learned we didn’t need to ban fracking to control climate change. But she didn’t say that either. She just repeated her view that her “values haven’t changed.” I believe her. Pennsylvanians might too.
Immigration? She touted the Lankford bill that Biden supported after three-and-a-half years of Harris gaslighting us that “the border is secure.” Here’s a question the press should and won’t ask: Why won’t she simply extend the administration’s recent executive order that is now reducing illegal immigration to lower levels than Lankford ever would? (To his credit, Ezra exposed Mayorkas on this today.) That’s because Lankford is designed to expedite the processing of illegal immigration, not stop it.
Sullivan brings up the fact that Harris did, on an ACLU questionnaire, support government-funded gender-change operations for illegal immigrants. That happens to be true, but the MSM acted as if Trump was simply pulling that accusation out of his fundament. (Don’t they read their own reportage?) And so Sullivan concludes:
The MSM, of course, can’t help themselves. They cheered Clinton at every opportunity in 2016; they didn’t criticize her execrable campaign exactly the way they are protecting Harris now. But the fact remains that Harris is still a blank space for many Americans; they want to know more about her and she doesn’t want to tell them — because the more they know about her past positions, the worse she’ll do. Hence a deeply cynical and vague campaign, still based more on vibes and Trump than on Harris’ policies or vision.
. . . Many voters will be picking between the devil they know (Trump) and the devil they don’t (Harris) this fall. She had a chance to fill in the blanks on Tuesday night; and, by and large, she didn’t. We’ll now see if others more competent than Trump and more willing than the MSM can begin to reveal who she really is and what she’d really do in office. And if that’s what the swing voters in Pennsylvania are truly looking for.
I’m still not excited about Harris, and this “joy” stuff simply makes me ill. There is no joy in this Mudville. Will I vote for Trump? Hell, no! The only question I’ll be pondering in November is whether I’ll write in somebody other than Harris. Remember, my vote is irrelevant in Democratic Illinois, and I’m sworn to vote for someone who impresses me. Harris doesn’t–at least not yet, but I’m following her pronouncements. (She really needs to give some interviews and press conferences.) And please don’t tell me that what I’ve just written will help Trump win.
*Finally, from the ever-reliable “Oddities” section of the AP, my favorite news: a cat rescue:
A cat aptly named Drifter is safe at home after sneaking outside and getting trapped in a sewer for nearly eight weeks.
The 3-year-old tabby — an indoor feline who had aspirations of being an outdoor cat — went missing from the home of Clifton Nesseth and Ashley Comstock in the northeastern Minnesota city of Duluth on July 18. His owners presume that he went to check out the construction underway in their neighborhood at some point.
The family, including their 12-year-old daughter, April Dressel, hung up posters and searched across the city without luck. They were beginning to plan a small memorial service for Drifter on Tuesday when neighbor kids came over and said they heard meowing coming from a storm drain at the construction site. The family also heard him meowing as they started digging through the dirt and cutting through the landscape fabric.
“A little paw shot out of a tear in the fabric,” Nesseth said. “It was a tabby cat paw. We tore the fabric more and then his head popped through.”
Here’s a video of Drifter’s rescue. How did he survive there for eight weeks? By drinking sewer water and eating rats?
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili (who is now 12) is being a bit lazy:
A: What do you think about a long walk?
Hili: Theoretically it’s an attractive suggestion.
A tweet from Masih, showing the results a horrible lashing of an Iranian man—drinking wine in his home!:
Lashed for drinking wine in Iran!
I received this photo from Isfahan, where the authorities raided his house for holding a mixed party which is illegal under Sharia law.
Meanwhile, the “reformist” president of this same country where a young man was lashed for sipping wine in… pic.twitter.com/tnWgOwgb2I
Mridul Wadhwa is gone from Edinburgh Rape Crisis. He should have been fired the moment he said that survivors who wanted a female-only space were bigots who should ‘reframe their trauma’.
From the Auschwitz Memorial, a six-year-old gassed upon arrival
14 September 1937 | A German Jewish boy, Günther Willi Aron, was born in Essen.
He arrived at #Auschwitz on 5 November 1943 in a transport of 1,000 Jews deported from ghetto in Riga. He was among 850 of them murdered in gas chambers after the selection. pic.twitter.com/wtgCiEHq9G
Thank you Jerry for posting Sarah Gillis’ Harmony of Resilience this morning. She is a true civilian astronaut, a SpaceX engineer learning first hand the ropes of orbital flight and, along with project sponsor Jared Isaacman, one of the two crew members to do an extra-vehicular activity (EVA) yesterday, popping out from the relative safety of the Dragon capsule into the void of space. I love the optimism of engaging with youngsters from around the world in demonstrating a beautiful aspect of our global culture, now extended beyond Earth’s globe into space. It is so nice to see all of these nations and their youth in such a positive light. Thank you Sarah!
Maybe because I am a sucker for these things, found this recording to be very moving.
I was similarly moved. I *want* to be moved.
Thanks for calling out the misuse of decimation everywhere you see it. Pedantic? Hell no.
It was a Roman punishment by lottery for mutiny in a legion or other large formation where putting all the participants to death would have been impractical.
The Roman/Latin term was “decimatus.” The term “decimate” has been used to mean “destroy” and related notions since the 1600s, so I am not sure that Prof Coyne’s description of it as “new” is wholly accurate. — Shakespeare is saturated with words whose meaning has changed, and the notion that we should all speak like the Bard or be criticized for misusing English is a bit silly.
The old conflict between prescriptive and descriptive linguistics is always amusing, but Wittgenstein’s suggestion that “meaning is use, and use, meaning” has always seemed to me to be a good start.
Well, you know, relatively new.
Would you accept the use of triumvirate to apply to a ruling council comprising a number of men other than three?
The Oxford English Dictionary lists three meanings for the verb “decimate.”
“1a. 1591–transitive. Chiefly Roman History. With reference to military punishment: to select by lot and put to death one in every ten of (a body of soldiers found guilty of desertion, mutiny, or other crime). Also occasionally intransitive. [12 examples given]
“1b. 1626–transitive. To kill, destroy, or remove one in every ten of.
In later use usually with an indication that the more general sense 1c is not intended, esp. by use of literally.” [8 examples given]
“1c. 1660–transitive. More generally: to reduce drastically or severely; to destroy, ruin, devastate. This use has sometimes been criticized on etymological grounds (see, for example, M. West & P. F. Kimber Deskbk. Correct Eng. (1957) 119 and quot. 1944), but is now the most usual sense in standard English.” [10 examples given, though only 3 pre-dating the 19th century]
I’ve noticed that the third usage of “decimate” has definitely become more widespread, especially among journalists and academics who used to know better. It’s slob English, used by people who have forgotten the word’s original and most meaningful definition and now just want a pretentious substitute for “destroy” or “devastate.”
If language is so mutable, then perhaps if enough people make clear that the third usage of decimate is pretentious wankery, then journalists and academics in search of ten dollar words might change their ways. After all, since language changes, there are many examples of words that go out of favor or change their already-altered meaning. So fight the slobs and Écrasez l’Infame!
Excellent points. I just read a book review in which the reviewer mentions a “character” in the book. What!? The reviewer clearly is unaware that the term is from the Greek “kharakter,” and originally referred to a stamping tool. I like the proposal that the reviewer was engaging in simple “pretentious wankery” and should restrict use of the term “character” to its original meaning. Thanks for the suggestion!
A commenter on the previous thread here described the reality of mob-spewed venom, as a response to the free speech issue.
When her description of that reality was described as “fishy”, her response was that the threats were not taken seriously by law enforcement. The disbelief of her experience was palpable.
To those who don’t believe her, please refer to Jerry’s item in this post about the police response to the threats at the Hillel dinner.
L
Jerry was reporting the Hillel diner episode as an example of antisemitism. To his great credit and strength of character as a free-speech defender he wasn’t claiming that this activity should not have enjoyed First Amendment protection. He has been entirely consistent in this at other exhibitions of same.
The “fishy” comment was a reply to a comment of mine. My thesis was that Leigh was spinning, for a political purpose, the events at the library in such a way to make it look as if Constitutionally protected speech had crossed a boundary into illegal activity. The only thing clearly illegal I saw in her account was the clumsy self-identified extortion demand called into a voice mail. The rest she described with enough vagueness that I couldn’t tell what exactly had happened, leaving me to suspect she was trying to censor the bad anti-LGBT Nazis who have the crazy idea that drag queens are grooming their children with the connivance of the county instead of welcoming inclusion and tolerance. I notice she didn’t respond to that.
By contrast, the description of events at the diner makes it perfectly clear what happened, including the police response and the absence of actual violence. Threats are in the eyes of the beholders. The police, who were there, decided no crime was being committed. I submit that you cannot say that the clearly described events at the diner are at all parallel to Leigh’s vague account. There isn’t even any mob-spewed venom (whatever that is) in her account….which is legal by any definition.
Can someone help me understand the rationale for the continued criticisms of Harris by people who abhor Trump (e.g., Sullivan and JC)?
If it’s because you believe she’s not doing enough to sway enough swing voters to turn the election against Trump, I think that’s mistaken. Anyone who, this late in the game, is ‘undecided’ between Harris and Trump isn’t basing their decision on any criteria that can be arrived at through reasoning about policy or specifics. Trump attempted to subvert the will of the people. Why would we put him back in office?
And any ‘never Trumpers’ who proclaim they plan to write-in a candidate are simply being performative. To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld: You go to the polls and vote for the candidates you have, not the candidates you wish you had.
I suspect you don’t really want to understand the criticisms of Harris, which have been made amply on this site and also by Andrew Sullivan and others who are either centrist-right or centrist-left. You just want to tell people to vote for Harris, despite her palpable flaws. My vote will not help Trump, which I’ve said endlessly. Illinois will go for Harris.
And no, I’m not being performative, because if I were, I’d tell people after I voted what I did, and I don’t plan to do that.In fact, I don’t even know if I’ll vote for Harris yet (she’s clearly the far better of the two candidates, but a vote for her in Illinois is performative! To paraphrase PCC(E), you go to the polls and vote for the candidate that you think can run America properly. I don’t see either of them able to do that to my satisfaction.
To the contrary, I completely understand the criticisms of Harris; I recognize her flaws. My question is: What’s the point?
We don’t want Trump to occupy the most powerful position in the world. How does endlessly critiquing Harris accomplish that?
The point is to move the Democratic party away from its increasing progressivism and more towards the center. Notice that Harris has already done that to get elected, though I suspect it’s a pragmatic move and a ruse. My brief includes that goal. And I don’t ENDLESSLY critique Harris; did you see my analysis of the debate.
How does my own voting for Harris in Illinois keep Trump from getting elected? If it did contribute to that, I’d vote for Harris.
Now this particular discussion is over. In my post I requested that readers not chew my tuchas about that, but you couldn’t resist.
+8
RE: Can someone help me understand the rationale for the continued criticisms of Harris by people who abhor Trump (e.g., Sullivan and JC)?
Response: It’s called journalism (in the case of Andrew Sullivan).
+1
Regarding Springfield, OH, who thought you it was a good idea to dump 20,000 refugees into a town of 60,000?
The city did have about 80,000 people in the 50s, 60s and 70s… so maybe it is just having a come back and we can see this population growth as an opportunity?
You say:
Israel has won the war, or at least achieved its aim of defeating Hamas. But two questions arise. The most important is: “What next?”.
I ask the same question. Can we now expect the bombings in Gaza to end? Can we expect that the population in Gaza can finally stay in one place instead of constantly moving from one safe zone to a different safe zone and back again? Can we expect the end to the deaths of children, women and protesters? I fear not but hope so.
The war would end if Hamas released the hostages. Refer questions on the war’s end to Hamas.
Bingo.
It’s been stated here many times and can’t be stated enough!
Protesters?
Is that a new category of vulnerable oppressed that the colonial regimes are oppressing?
I was wondering what he’s talking about, too. Interesting add on…
I was thinking of the example of an American citizen killed while protesting in the West Bank. And yes, I know the West Bank is not Gaza, and yes, I doubt that the population in Gaza has any energy to protest: they are undoubtedly busy trying to survive.
Why do you think Israel would have a reason to waste ordnance and jet fuel bombing Gaza if various jihadists were no longer firing rockets at Israel’s towns and cities and murdering people in kibbutzes? If you would prefer that Israel not chivvy civilians out of harm’s way when it does need to bomb the occasional die-hard rocket fanatics, you’ll get no demurral from me there. Israelis wouldn’t go for it, though.
The Palestinians we see on TV seem pretty well fed, doing better than many wretched of the earth. Supporting a militarized death cult is hazardous to one’s health, though, for sure. But Israel wasn’t bombing Gaza before October 7. It’s a good bet she’ll stop eventually.
Armando, my friend: She – a foreigner – undertook a hostile, partisan journey costing thousands, to destroy and attack a friendly to the US state, in a war zone.
She wasn’t sitting on a park bench in Manhattan.
Were she a non-telegenic, non-sexy man, you would never have heard of her.
She should have been arrested as an enemy combatant at the airport.
To lose her is no loss to humanity – except to her deranged murderous Islamist allies.
D.A
NYC
Maybe starting a war could have been better thought out by Hamas?
Or as the younger generation say: FAFO*
I have zero sympathy for the Gazans (almost all of them) who call for the destruction of the Israeli state and all its citizens.
D.A.
NYC
*F around and find out.
Excellent review of the news. Yes. Israel is winning. But what happens next is very unclear. Will the hostages ever be freed? What can Hamas leadership possibly get in return for them now other than perhaps safe passage out of the region. I fear for the hostages.
Whatever happens in Israel, I also fear that a torrent of antisemitic and anti-Israel hate has been unleashed in the U.S. and elsewhere that will take many years to abate. That’s the thing about antisemitism. It’s always there, just beneath the surface, ready to emerge at the slightest provocation. Noa Tishby’s latest book with Emmanuel Acho covers the topic well: https://www.noatishby.com/book.
Every time I hear the word decimated misused, I tell my wife “Decimated means reduced by one-tenth!” She’s tired of hearing it, but I can’t help myself. It’s the “free will” thing again.
And finally, Vice President Harris. We still don’t know what we’re getting with her. She can get herself invited to any news outlet in the country for a sit-down interview, but she won’t unless the venue is predictable and controlled—like the CNN interview with Dana Bash. She knows that people want to hear her positions and that they want a chance to go back and forth with her in order to reach clarity. The fact that she knows this but is unwilling (so far) to subject herself to scrutiny tells us something. Either she doesn’t have solid positions on the issues of the day or she doesn’t want us to know them. I won’t vote for Trump. I’d kinda, sorta, like to vote for Harris, but she’s not helping me here. Submitting a write-in vote is very possible.
If Harris does win, it will be better if she and the country do not have to deal with the Speaker of the House being unable to get a budget through. Having the government shut down is not a good thing, and one’s vote for Congressperson can be important for this issue. And if Harris does win, it seems to me better if she can appoint Cabinet officers than for this to be impossible , owing to votes in the Senate. So, again, one’s votes for Senate and Congress can matter a lot. And even if you are in a state where you can’t affect the outcome, like Liz Cheney in Wyoming, your support can affect whether the country is governable, if you support candidates in elections which are close.
I believe I’ve already said that, on my part, I’ve already decided to vote Democratic for the other candidates in my state, as that could make a difference. While both of my Senators (Durbin and Duckworth) are not up for election in November, other people are, people where I can make a difference and will try to.
That TikTok/X video by Benny Johnson of Trump vs Harris is hilarious!
Sullivan did hit the nail on the head when he wrote about Harris’ “deeply cynical and vague
campaign”. He stayed out of the mud and came up with a description that’s entirely accurate.
My favorite cat story today is of Drifter being saved from the storm drain. I’m also gladdened to learn that Hili is only 12. She’s barely hit middle age.
Re “What next?”, I have a proposal that might contain the seeds of a good idea.
I call it the “done-state solution”, or the Knox Plan (this immodesty maybe increasing my slim chance of sharing a Nobel Peace Prize). Its mechanism is “ethnic reverting”: Israel and Egypt sign a treaty that returns the Gaza province back to Egypt, with very few restrictions (forbidding the stationing of heavy weapons, etc.). Voilà, there are no more “Palestinians” in Gaza, only Egyptians, just like there used to be.
No new state or states need be created (hence “done-state”). The US can be involved by structuring its large foreign aid to Israel and Egypt in ways that facilitate the plan. The rest of the world can butt out.
The Egyptian dictatorship has a consistent history of repressing Islamists, by any means necessary. So that’s no longer Israel’s problem. If Egypt allowed terrorist attacks on Israel across the Gaza border then that would be an act of war, the plausible consequences of which should give pause to any Egyptian leader contemplating such a move. Egypt can forestall ex-Palestinian agitation by imposing movement restrictions and harsh penalties on the residents of Gaza Province, a purely domestic action.
I welcome your comments.
It could work, Nobel-laureate Knox.
Who’s going to provide the 2 million coffins Egypt will need for its new (temporary) citizens?
Yes, Leslie. See below.
D.A.
I don’t think Egypt wants it back. The resident Palestinians are very radicalized.
Palestinians have caused problems before: in Lebanon for example.
They’re troublemakers.
Sadly, I do not think you are in for a trip to Stockholm. The fact is that NO Arab country, much less Egypt, wants to take the Palestinians. They know what comes with them–terrorism.
Indeed. But the carrot is that Egypt gets back a valuable chunk of Mediterranean realestate and significant aid/bribes from the US and maybe others. And the terrorists can be mostly confined to Gaza by appropriate repressive internal security and naval patrols. ISTM the Palestinians viscerally hate the Israelis, but only moderately hate their Arab “brothers” who abandoned them, so maybe Egypt could control them.
Since none of the other proposed “solutions” have any real prospects, maybe my plan would at least be worth investigating.
And I’ve already been to Sweden as a tourist, so not getting a NP won’t be a big disappointment. Plus, I have absolutely nothing appropriate to wear.
Nobody wants Gaza as a place. Egypt’s owning of it would be a detriment to Egypt.
And to repeat PPC’s point, NOBODY wants the Palestinians. For excellent reasons – an entire culture can become toxic if you pour in the right ingredients for 70+ (or 1300) years.
Thank you Jerry for posting Sarah Gillis’ Harmony of Resilience this morning. She is a true civilian astronaut, a SpaceX engineer learning first hand the ropes of orbital flight and, along with project sponsor Jared Isaacman, one of the two crew members to do an extra-vehicular activity (EVA) yesterday, popping out from the relative safety of the Dragon capsule into the void of space. I love the optimism of engaging with youngsters from around the world in demonstrating a beautiful aspect of our global culture, now extended beyond Earth’s globe into space. It is so nice to see all of these nations and their youth in such a positive light. Thank you Sarah!
Maybe because I am a sucker for these things, found this recording to be very moving.
I was similarly moved. I *want* to be moved.
Thanks for calling out the misuse of decimation everywhere you see it. Pedantic? Hell no.
It was a Roman punishment by lottery for mutiny in a legion or other large formation where putting all the participants to death would have been impractical.
The Roman/Latin term was “decimatus.” The term “decimate” has been used to mean “destroy” and related notions since the 1600s, so I am not sure that Prof Coyne’s description of it as “new” is wholly accurate. — Shakespeare is saturated with words whose meaning has changed, and the notion that we should all speak like the Bard or be criticized for misusing English is a bit silly.
The old conflict between prescriptive and descriptive linguistics is always amusing, but Wittgenstein’s suggestion that “meaning is use, and use, meaning” has always seemed to me to be a good start.
Well, you know, relatively new.
Would you accept the use of triumvirate to apply to a ruling council comprising a number of men other than three?
The Oxford English Dictionary lists three meanings for the verb “decimate.”
“1a. 1591–transitive. Chiefly Roman History. With reference to military punishment: to select by lot and put to death one in every ten of (a body of soldiers found guilty of desertion, mutiny, or other crime). Also occasionally intransitive. [12 examples given]
“1b. 1626–transitive. To kill, destroy, or remove one in every ten of.
In later use usually with an indication that the more general sense 1c is not intended, esp. by use of literally.” [8 examples given]
“1c. 1660–transitive. More generally: to reduce drastically or severely; to destroy, ruin, devastate. This use has sometimes been criticized on etymological grounds (see, for example, M. West & P. F. Kimber Deskbk. Correct Eng. (1957) 119 and quot. 1944), but is now the most usual sense in standard English.” [10 examples given, though only 3 pre-dating the 19th century]
I’ve noticed that the third usage of “decimate” has definitely become more widespread, especially among journalists and academics who used to know better. It’s slob English, used by people who have forgotten the word’s original and most meaningful definition and now just want a pretentious substitute for “destroy” or “devastate.”
If language is so mutable, then perhaps if enough people make clear that the third usage of decimate is pretentious wankery, then journalists and academics in search of ten dollar words might change their ways. After all, since language changes, there are many examples of words that go out of favor or change their already-altered meaning. So fight the slobs and Écrasez l’Infame!
Excellent points. I just read a book review in which the reviewer mentions a “character” in the book. What!? The reviewer clearly is unaware that the term is from the Greek “kharakter,” and originally referred to a stamping tool. I like the proposal that the reviewer was engaging in simple “pretentious wankery” and should restrict use of the term “character” to its original meaning. Thanks for the suggestion!
A commenter on the previous thread here described the reality of mob-spewed venom, as a response to the free speech issue.
When her description of that reality was described as “fishy”, her response was that the threats were not taken seriously by law enforcement. The disbelief of her experience was palpable.
To those who don’t believe her, please refer to Jerry’s item in this post about the police response to the threats at the Hillel dinner.
L
Jerry was reporting the Hillel diner episode as an example of antisemitism. To his great credit and strength of character as a free-speech defender he wasn’t claiming that this activity should not have enjoyed First Amendment protection. He has been entirely consistent in this at other exhibitions of same.
The “fishy” comment was a reply to a comment of mine. My thesis was that Leigh was spinning, for a political purpose, the events at the library in such a way to make it look as if Constitutionally protected speech had crossed a boundary into illegal activity. The only thing clearly illegal I saw in her account was the clumsy self-identified extortion demand called into a voice mail. The rest she described with enough vagueness that I couldn’t tell what exactly had happened, leaving me to suspect she was trying to censor the bad anti-LGBT Nazis who have the crazy idea that drag queens are grooming their children with the connivance of the county instead of welcoming inclusion and tolerance. I notice she didn’t respond to that.
By contrast, the description of events at the diner makes it perfectly clear what happened, including the police response and the absence of actual violence. Threats are in the eyes of the beholders. The police, who were there, decided no crime was being committed. I submit that you cannot say that the clearly described events at the diner are at all parallel to Leigh’s vague account. There isn’t even any mob-spewed venom (whatever that is) in her account….which is legal by any definition.
Can someone help me understand the rationale for the continued criticisms of Harris by people who abhor Trump (e.g., Sullivan and JC)?
If it’s because you believe she’s not doing enough to sway enough swing voters to turn the election against Trump, I think that’s mistaken. Anyone who, this late in the game, is ‘undecided’ between Harris and Trump isn’t basing their decision on any criteria that can be arrived at through reasoning about policy or specifics. Trump attempted to subvert the will of the people. Why would we put him back in office?
And any ‘never Trumpers’ who proclaim they plan to write-in a candidate are simply being performative. To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld: You go to the polls and vote for the candidates you have, not the candidates you wish you had.
I suspect you don’t really want to understand the criticisms of Harris, which have been made amply on this site and also by Andrew Sullivan and others who are either centrist-right or centrist-left. You just want to tell people to vote for Harris, despite her palpable flaws. My vote will not help Trump, which I’ve said endlessly. Illinois will go for Harris.
And no, I’m not being performative, because if I were, I’d tell people after I voted what I did, and I don’t plan to do that.In fact, I don’t even know if I’ll vote for Harris yet (she’s clearly the far better of the two candidates, but a vote for her in Illinois is performative! To paraphrase PCC(E), you go to the polls and vote for the candidate that you think can run America properly. I don’t see either of them able to do that to my satisfaction.
To the contrary, I completely understand the criticisms of Harris; I recognize her flaws. My question is: What’s the point?
We don’t want Trump to occupy the most powerful position in the world. How does endlessly critiquing Harris accomplish that?
The point is to move the Democratic party away from its increasing progressivism and more towards the center. Notice that Harris has already done that to get elected, though I suspect it’s a pragmatic move and a ruse. My brief includes that goal. And I don’t ENDLESSLY critique Harris; did you see my analysis of the debate.
How does my own voting for Harris in Illinois keep Trump from getting elected? If it did contribute to that, I’d vote for Harris.
Now this particular discussion is over. In my post I requested that readers not chew my tuchas about that, but you couldn’t resist.
+8
RE: Can someone help me understand the rationale for the continued criticisms of Harris by people who abhor Trump (e.g., Sullivan and JC)?
Response: It’s called journalism (in the case of Andrew Sullivan).
+1
Regarding Springfield, OH, who thought you it was a good idea to dump 20,000 refugees into a town of 60,000?
The city did have about 80,000 people in the 50s, 60s and 70s… so maybe it is just having a come back and we can see this population growth as an opportunity?
You say:
Israel has won the war, or at least achieved its aim of defeating Hamas. But two questions arise. The most important is: “What next?”.
I ask the same question. Can we now expect the bombings in Gaza to end? Can we expect that the population in Gaza can finally stay in one place instead of constantly moving from one safe zone to a different safe zone and back again? Can we expect the end to the deaths of children, women and protesters? I fear not but hope so.
The war would end if Hamas released the hostages. Refer questions on the war’s end to Hamas.
Bingo.
It’s been stated here many times and can’t be stated enough!
Protesters?
Is that a new category of vulnerable oppressed that the colonial regimes are oppressing?
I was wondering what he’s talking about, too. Interesting add on…
I was thinking of the example of an American citizen killed while protesting in the West Bank. And yes, I know the West Bank is not Gaza, and yes, I doubt that the population in Gaza has any energy to protest: they are undoubtedly busy trying to survive.
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/body-turkish-american-activist-killed-west-bank-arrives-turkey-2024-09-13/
Why do you think Israel would have a reason to waste ordnance and jet fuel bombing Gaza if various jihadists were no longer firing rockets at Israel’s towns and cities and murdering people in kibbutzes? If you would prefer that Israel not chivvy civilians out of harm’s way when it does need to bomb the occasional die-hard rocket fanatics, you’ll get no demurral from me there. Israelis wouldn’t go for it, though.
The Palestinians we see on TV seem pretty well fed, doing better than many wretched of the earth. Supporting a militarized death cult is hazardous to one’s health, though, for sure. But Israel wasn’t bombing Gaza before October 7. It’s a good bet she’ll stop eventually.
Armando, my friend: She – a foreigner – undertook a hostile, partisan journey costing thousands, to destroy and attack a friendly to the US state, in a war zone.
She wasn’t sitting on a park bench in Manhattan.
Were she a non-telegenic, non-sexy man, you would never have heard of her.
She should have been arrested as an enemy combatant at the airport.
To lose her is no loss to humanity – except to her deranged murderous Islamist allies.
D.A
NYC
Maybe starting a war could have been better thought out by Hamas?
Or as the younger generation say: FAFO*
I have zero sympathy for the Gazans (almost all of them) who call for the destruction of the Israeli state and all its citizens.
D.A.
NYC
*F around and find out.
Excellent review of the news. Yes. Israel is winning. But what happens next is very unclear. Will the hostages ever be freed? What can Hamas leadership possibly get in return for them now other than perhaps safe passage out of the region. I fear for the hostages.
Whatever happens in Israel, I also fear that a torrent of antisemitic and anti-Israel hate has been unleashed in the U.S. and elsewhere that will take many years to abate. That’s the thing about antisemitism. It’s always there, just beneath the surface, ready to emerge at the slightest provocation. Noa Tishby’s latest book with Emmanuel Acho covers the topic well: https://www.noatishby.com/book.
Every time I hear the word decimated misused, I tell my wife “Decimated means reduced by one-tenth!” She’s tired of hearing it, but I can’t help myself. It’s the “free will” thing again.
And finally, Vice President Harris. We still don’t know what we’re getting with her. She can get herself invited to any news outlet in the country for a sit-down interview, but she won’t unless the venue is predictable and controlled—like the CNN interview with Dana Bash. She knows that people want to hear her positions and that they want a chance to go back and forth with her in order to reach clarity. The fact that she knows this but is unwilling (so far) to subject herself to scrutiny tells us something. Either she doesn’t have solid positions on the issues of the day or she doesn’t want us to know them. I won’t vote for Trump. I’d kinda, sorta, like to vote for Harris, but she’s not helping me here. Submitting a write-in vote is very possible.
If Harris does win, it will be better if she and the country do not have to deal with the Speaker of the House being unable to get a budget through. Having the government shut down is not a good thing, and one’s vote for Congressperson can be important for this issue. And if Harris does win, it seems to me better if she can appoint Cabinet officers than for this to be impossible , owing to votes in the Senate. So, again, one’s votes for Senate and Congress can matter a lot. And even if you are in a state where you can’t affect the outcome, like Liz Cheney in Wyoming, your support can affect whether the country is governable, if you support candidates in elections which are close.
I believe I’ve already said that, on my part, I’ve already decided to vote Democratic for the other candidates in my state, as that could make a difference. While both of my Senators (Durbin and Duckworth) are not up for election in November, other people are, people where I can make a difference and will try to.
https://x.com/MadisonKittay/status/1834701446496805126
this was an interesting take….
But but
https://x.com/EndWokeness/status/1834083201314181225
+1
That TikTok/X video by Benny Johnson of Trump vs Harris is hilarious!
Sullivan did hit the nail on the head when he wrote about Harris’ “deeply cynical and vague
campaign”. He stayed out of the mud and came up with a description that’s entirely accurate.
My favorite cat story today is of Drifter being saved from the storm drain. I’m also gladdened to learn that Hili is only 12. She’s barely hit middle age.
Re “What next?”, I have a proposal that might contain the seeds of a good idea.
I call it the “done-state solution”, or the Knox Plan (this immodesty maybe increasing my slim chance of sharing a Nobel Peace Prize). Its mechanism is “ethnic reverting”: Israel and Egypt sign a treaty that returns the Gaza province back to Egypt, with very few restrictions (forbidding the stationing of heavy weapons, etc.). Voilà, there are no more “Palestinians” in Gaza, only Egyptians, just like there used to be.
No new state or states need be created (hence “done-state”). The US can be involved by structuring its large foreign aid to Israel and Egypt in ways that facilitate the plan. The rest of the world can butt out.
The Egyptian dictatorship has a consistent history of repressing Islamists, by any means necessary. So that’s no longer Israel’s problem. If Egypt allowed terrorist attacks on Israel across the Gaza border then that would be an act of war, the plausible consequences of which should give pause to any Egyptian leader contemplating such a move. Egypt can forestall ex-Palestinian agitation by imposing movement restrictions and harsh penalties on the residents of Gaza Province, a purely domestic action.
I welcome your comments.
It could work, Nobel-laureate Knox.
Who’s going to provide the 2 million coffins Egypt will need for its new (temporary) citizens?
Yes, Leslie. See below.
D.A.
I don’t think Egypt wants it back. The resident Palestinians are very radicalized.
Palestinians have caused problems before: in Lebanon for example.
They’re troublemakers.
Sadly, I do not think you are in for a trip to Stockholm. The fact is that NO Arab country, much less Egypt, wants to take the Palestinians. They know what comes with them–terrorism.
Indeed. But the carrot is that Egypt gets back a valuable chunk of Mediterranean realestate and significant aid/bribes from the US and maybe others. And the terrorists can be mostly confined to Gaza by appropriate repressive internal security and naval patrols. ISTM the Palestinians viscerally hate the Israelis, but only moderately hate their Arab “brothers” who abandoned them, so maybe Egypt could control them.
Since none of the other proposed “solutions” have any real prospects, maybe my plan would at least be worth investigating.
And I’ve already been to Sweden as a tourist, so not getting a NP won’t be a big disappointment. Plus, I have absolutely nothing appropriate to wear.
Nobody wants Gaza as a place. Egypt’s owning of it would be a detriment to Egypt.
And to repeat PPC’s point, NOBODY wants the Palestinians. For excellent reasons – an entire culture can become toxic if you pour in the right ingredients for 70+ (or 1300) years.
I explain why in a recent article of mine I can’t help myself reposting here:
https://democracychronicles.org/worst-houseguests-ever-the-palestinians/
Variously syndicated.
D.A.
NYC