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Those of us who follow the Arab war against Israel are often perplexed by the emphasis many people place on Levantine Arab refugees. As Mandel reminds us, we hear that there are three million of these refugees, and that Israel is responsible for their plight. But Mandel also points out that the problem of the Arab refugees from Israel were caused not by the creation of Israel but by the war that Arabs launched against it. And that the aggressors are responsible. In addition, while refugees have a number of rights, repatriation is not typically one of them. I would add that most of the so-called refugees are not those who actually used to live in Israel but are merely those who claim to be the descendants of those who did.

In any case, this article deals almost entirely with a group of roughly equivalent size that became genuine refugees, namely the Jews from Arab lands. As the author shows, most of them truly were "compelled to emigrate." The Arabs who kicked them out did not do so out of a need to defend themselves. Instead, "they merely turned on an unwanted, exploitable minority."

We get to read about the Jews of Iraq, a nation which got rid of its Jews in the twentieth century, bringing an end to 25 centuries of Jewish history there. And of Syria, Libya, Yemen, and Algeria. Of Egypt, Tunisia, and Morocco. It's amazing. Overall, these nations basically chased away 99% of their Jews. Meanwhile, they accuse Israel, which has a million Arabs in its population, of ethnic cleansing!

This is a very good article, and I highly recommend it.

Joan of Arcadia was very entertaining. It hit all emotions and done with humor as well. I loved it. I was surprised it didn't have a third season. I was dissappointed when it didn't come back on. Still don't know why it went off the air. I also loved the music in the show. I wish when they did the "Special Features" it could have listed the songs/artist listed of each episode per disc. I loved the music, but have know way of knowing the titles or singers who did them.

I read this book for a graduate Mill seminar in Philosophy. Recommended reading for anyone interested in education, philosophy, political science, and history.

John Stuart Mill, 1806-73, worked for the East India Co. helped run Colonial India from England. Minister of Parliament 1865-68 he served one term.

Lynn Zastoupil's book notes that John Mill essentially entered the family business. His father James started working in 1819 for the East India Company, eventually rising to a position of prominence by 1830; responsible for the oversight of all the company's communiqués to India. James obtained a position for his son John in 1823. I find it ironic that one of John's early projects was recommending a strategy to the board of directors on how the company would fulfill its obligations in educating the indigenous Indian population. This is ironic because of his ability to experience what was lacking in his own formal education, the learning, and appreciation of current literature and poetry, which in turn spoke to the needs of his psychological well-being, caused him to realize a sea change in his educational philosophy from that which he inherited from his father. This epiphany caused him to act against his father's beliefs concerning the proper educational requirements for the populace of India. Thus, Zastoupil noted that Mill had discovered a "newfound regard for internal culture and the value of emotions for a balanced life."

In part, this new discovery for Mill in the 1830's came from his readings of the German romantic philosopher Johan Gottfried von Herder. Herder's ideas of cultural pluralism made sense to Mill in light of the fact that India had a multitude of sub cultures, not to mention adherents of the Hindu, Moslem, and Sikh religions. Zastoupil notes that Mill successfully convinced British educational leaders in India House that "progress requires the cultivation of the mind and not merely the restructuring of social and political institutions." Thus, I think that a synthesis of Herder's ideas on cultural pluralism and Mill's many years of working in Indian affairs made him realize that to foster a healthy and harmonious society multiculturalism had an important place in education. This realization is further witnessed when one reads Mill's essay on Considerations on Representative Government. In the essay, Mill envisioned the ability of a multiethnic nation to forge a strong society by embracing and adopting the best from its cultural diversity.

It is rare in a philosopher's life that they have the opportunity to influence public policy. It had to be professionally rewarding that Mill had this opportunity in his work with India House. Mill helped to successfully bring about a transformation of Indian society, which most certainly changed the course of its history. I think his educational reform work has been a part of the success in making India by population, currently the largest democracy today on the planet.

Peter G. Davis (esteemed critic and author of Doubleday's "The American Opera Singer") called it "among the most impressive books I have ever read about an individual singer. ...objectively written, painstakingly researched, immensely readable...."
Andrew Porter, British critical guru, said it is "a vivid portrait of the most exciting tenor in the second half of the 20th century," and Antony Peattie of BBC Music Magazine said it's "one of the best studies of a singer that I have ever read."
Urjo Kareda said in Opera Canada, "...(Williams) has done her work lovingly and meticulously, with splendid documentation.... Vickers' is a voice for the ages, never to be forgotten. This book makes us hear him."

There is always a risk that people will toss journalistic or academic standards to the winds and substitute sensationalist propaganda for what is supposed to be scholarly or reputable work. Has Robert Fisk done this? Keith Windschuttle makes a good argument for that being the case.

We start with Fisk's description of Osama Bin Laden, one similar to T. E. Lawrence's description of Prince Feisal. In both, we see implications that we're dealing with a noble aristocrat! And Windschuttle argues that "this same hankering after the trappings of aristocracy, or anything that smacks of aristocracy, is behind much of the anti-American and anti-Jewish sentiment that now emanates from the European news media, especially in the writings of European leftists such as Fisk."

That's an interesting point. It may indeed be true that some of these reporters see Jews as anything but aristocrats, and see Arab terrorists as "freedom fighters." Of course, my reaction to this is very negative. Today, those who like human rights would strongly reject the idea of calling the Ku Klux Klan leaders aristocratic freedom fighters. They would also reject the idea of calling the German National Socialists aristocratic freedom fighters. One day, Arab terrorists may be seen in a much more accurate light as well.

Windschuttle shows how, in the book "Tell Me Lies," Fisk and John Pilger basically blame the 9/11/2001 attacks on the United States itself. And he points out the timing of their comments: Pilger was writing on the very day that the United States was attacked!

It is already a travesty of journalism to come up with misleading work of this sort. Still, what about the facts that Fisk or Pilger cite? Are they relevant? Are they accurate? Windschuttle shows that Pilger has a problem with some facts as well. We see how Pilger overestimates the Iraqi deaths in the first Gulf War by an order of magnitude.

Windschuttle concludes that Fisk and Pilger have been betraying their profession. He gives Thucydides as an example of far better reporting. And he cautions that one ought not regard criticism of Fisk and Pilger as merely political in nature. The issue is not liberals versus conservatives, but sophistry versus scholarship. As Windschuttle says, "one betrays the great tradition of Western journalism and one confirms it."

I highly recommend this article.

This excellent article demonstrates the decline of Middle Eastern studies and "the widespread urge" of its practitioners "to promote polemic over scholarship." The focus is on Juan Cole, the President of this country's Middle East Studies Association.

Just how bad is Cole? This article gives us a big clue. We see his absurd comparison of the Likud party in Israel with the Baath party in Syria. We see him call peaceful demonstrations in Israel's free society as "fascist in nature." We see him suggest that those in America who support Israel's right to exist are in fact guilty of dual loyalties. Cole has said that "pro-Likud intellectuals" want to use the Pentagon to fight elective wars "on behalf of Tel Aviv" (I'm impressed with Cole's impudence here, not even referring to Israel by the name of its capital, Jerusalem). Cole says these folks do so "to increase Israel's ability to annex land and act aggressively" especially if "someone else's boys" do the dying. Such statements are totally flaky. What are they doing coming from the mouth of a supposedly responsible professor?

We see Cole discuss even the opposition to genocide in Darfur as being inappropriately allied to "rightwing Zionists." And we also see this gem from Cole:

"Even medieval Islamic law recognized the right of Christians, Jews, and other monotheists to practice their religion and enjoy rights to their lives and property. This relative tolerance has often been enhanced in the twentieth century by the rise of nationalism, wherein Arab Christians sometimes are privileged as symbols of national authenticity because Christianity predated Islam in the nation's history."

Of course, the above statement is complete nonsense.

I highly recommend this article.

The Kahr T9 isn't the smallest or lightest carry gun out there but the ones that are seem to run into reliability issues and are marginally accurate when facing the pressure of a crisis situation. This gun is not only the most attractive gun I've seen, with its fine hardwood stocks, but it is proving to be stone cold reliable and surprisingly accurate as well. With all steel construction the extra weight makes for rapid shot controllability and a pleasing lack of recoil. That, along with a very slick DAO trigger makes this a nice plinking/target gun--promoting the frequent practice a licensed gun carrier should demand of himself or herself!

This is the first of the massive 50 volume set of everything ever written by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels.

This volume contains the Doctoral Disertation and other early works of Karl Marx. It is a very interesting view into the early beliefs of the great nineteenth century thinker and economist.

Tsakalakis is one of the very few contemporary Greek novelists worth reading! This is his first literary endeavor, and as such it does have its drawbacks. Nonetheless, the author showed signs of a rather promising up-and-coming writer early on. I happen to own his sophomore work as well, and it's even better than the first one! It's called "Ritores, Ktitores, ki Epibitores...". I'm anxiously waiting for his third novel!

I am the co-author and also joint copyright owner of this piece.

You can download it for free on ssrn.com. In addition, I consider making this download available to be copyright infringement.

Tim