The Israeli "Fahrenheit 9/11"

A formidable lesson about censorship from the Israeli high court. From the BBC:
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The military raid on Jenin followed a suicide bomb attack on Netanya

A fresh attempt to ban a documentary film about the Israeli army's invasion of a West Bank refugee camp has failed.

Israel's film board banned Jenin, Jenin from being shown in the Jewish state last year, saying it presented a distorted version of events in Jenin.

But on Monday Israel's High Court reinstated a ruling which overturned the ban, saying the film board did not have "a monopoly over truth".

Fighting in the camp in April 2002 left 52 Palestinians and 23 Israelis dead.

The eight-day military operation in Jenin followed a suicide bomb attack on the Israeli town of Netanya which killed 28 Israelis celebrating Passover.

'Propagandistic lie'

Directed by Israeli Arab film-maker Mohammad Bakri, Jenin, Jenin was shown three times in Israel before it was banned last year.

The High Court ruled that the film board had overstepped its mandate by imposing the ban. An order staying last year's ruling was lifted.

Director Bakri insisted that he had a right to present a Palestinian point of view and rejected an earlier proposal by the court to cut several scenes.

Despite rejecting the ban, the court described Jenin, Jenin as a "propagandistic lie" which falsely accused Israeli soldiers of intentionally killing children, women, the disabled and the mentally ill.

Delivering the original Supreme Court ruling last November, Justice Dalia Dorner said: "The fact that the film includes lies is not enough to justify a ban."

It marked the first time in 15 years that Israel had banned a movie. In 1987, it prevented Japanese film Empire of the Senses from being screened due to its pornographic content.

Clear Channel's Trojan Horse

The LA Times reports that Clear Channel has come up with an idea for a Trojan Horse -- literally and figuratively:

Starting next year, Clear Channel Communications Inc. plans to send a large wooden version of the Trojan horse on a tour of U.S. museums as a frontispiece to an exhibition on ancient Greece and Troy. Clear Channel's empire-building in the arts extends further — to touring Broadway musicals, where its omnipresence as a producer and presenter can mean trouble for competitors and cause wariness even among its partners. Cultural gatekeepers, including art critics and museum directors, have begun sounding a warning: Beware of a conglomerate bearing art.

Gerhard Stirred

Here is a bizarre typo from the online edition of today's NYT story on the Milosevic trial:

His lawyers say he wants to call former President Bill Clinton, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and German Chancellor Gerhard Stirred, among many other foreign politicians. The judges can refuse to call witnesses if they are considered irrelevant to the defense case.
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Gerhard Stirred? Is that the beginning of a nursery rhyme?

It hasn't been corrected by 5:15, so it's probably already screwing up Yahoo searches or wreaking havoc on the Internet somehow or other.

When Helicopters Meet Antiquity

While scholars and cultural heritage groups are talking about restoring the Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan, not all antiquities in lands under American occupation are quite so hunky-dory. Iraq's heritage continues to suffer. Zainab Bahrani of The Guardian reports:
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Active damage of the historical record is ongoing at several archeological sites occupied as military camps. At Babylon, I have seen the continuing construction projects, the removal of and digging into the ancient mounds over the past three months, despite a coalition press release early in June stating that work would halt, and the camp would be removed.

A helicopter landing zone, built in the heart of the ancient city, removed layers of archeological earth from the site. The daily flights of the helicopters rattle the ancient walls and the winds created by their rotors blast sand against the fragile bricks. When my colleague at the site, Maryam Moussa, and I asked military personnel in charge that the helipad be shut down, the response was that it had to remain open for security reasons, for the safety of the troops.

Between May and August, the wall of the Temple of Nabu and the roof of the Temple of Ninmah, both sixth century BC, collapsed as a result of the movement of helicopters. Nearby, heavy machines and vehicles stand parked on the remains of a Greek theatre from the era of Alexander of Macedon. The minister of culture has asked for the removal of military bases from all archeological sites, but none has yet been relocated.

While the Astrodome Is Gone, Astro-Turf is Back

Astroturfing has been a popular blogosphere topic lately. Is it ever appropriate? Will it ever be avoidable? Here's an update on the latest happenings. From PRWatch.org:
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The Daily Kos recently uncovered an astroturf (fake grassroots) initiative by the George W. Bush campaign, which generated ghostwritten letters to the editor that found their way into at least 60 newspapers. This isn't the first time that the Bush administration has tried this trick, as we've reported in the past. According to Editor and Publisher, however, the National Conference of Editorial Writers (NCEW) is now taking the issue seriously. "On its NCEW e-mail listserv, some 600 subscribers who are mostly editorial page writers and editors, can alert one another of suspicious letters," writes Charles Geraci. "In fact, this is the most consistent topic on the listserv." Meanwhile, the Columbia Journalism Review's Campaign Desk critiques the Washington Post's coverage of the topic, showing how an "obsession with 'even-handedness'" led the Post to falsely claim that the Kerry campaign is doing the same thing. Source: Editor and Publisher, August 27, 2004

Novak's Parallel Ethical Universe

From PRWatch.org:

Conservative columnist Bob Novak has touted the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth book Unfit for Command without revealing that his son heads marketing and PR for its publisher," O'Dwyer's PR Daily reports. The New York Times writes that Novak has "lauded" the book in his syndicated columns and on CNN's 'Crossfire.' "Unmentioned in Mr. Novak's columns and television appearances, however, is a personal connection he has to the book: his son, Alex Novak, is the director of marketing for its publisher, the conservative publishing house Regnery," the Times writes. Source: O'Dwyer's PR Daily (sub. req'd), August 30, 2004

Get Ready for "Amer-ee-ka"

Mark Tushnet takes David Brooks to task for something that Brooks (a moderate, Schwarzeneggerian conservative) surely understands all too well:
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Evidence that the media need constitutional advisers (I'm available for my usual hourly rate):

1. In the New York Times Magazine article on where the Republicans should go, David Brooks writes: "Nobody knows who the nominee will be [in 2008]. It could be Bill Frist, Chuck Hagel, Rudy Giuliani, Gov. Bill Owens of Colorado or somebody else -- maybe even Arnold Schwarzenegger." Not the last, unless the Constitution's amended or the Republicans again engage in extremely creative constitutional interpretation. The Constitution says (subject to a provision applicable only for a generation after 1789) that only "natural born Citizen[s]" are eligible for the Presidency. So far at least that has been interpreted to mean that naturalized citizens are ineligible. (There's a minor question, which arose when George Romney [born to U.S. citizen parents in Mexico] tried to get the Republican nomination, about whether people born outside the United States who nonetheless have citizenship at birth because their parents are citizens are eligible, but I think the judgment of experts, such as it is, is that they *are* eligible.) Schwarzenegger is, of course, a naturalized citizen.

The Constitution could be amended. Or maybe Schwarzenegger's supporters will start to urge seriously the argument, made as a joke by specialists when the quextion comes up, that "natural born citizen" means "delivered in the natural way, not by Caesarian."

2. We saw the remake of "The Manchurian Candidate" yesterday (review: They managed to make a boring thriller; see the original instead). At one point the charcter played by Glenn CLose, a U.S. Senator, threatens another Senator with impeachment. Nope: The Senate decided in 1798 that it could not use impeachment to remove its own members, in the case of William Blount of Tennessee, who had been charged with conspiring with the British to take over Spanish territory in Florida and Louisiana. (The Senate expelled Blount instead.)

Weblog: Slouching Towards Gomorrah?

Convention-blogging (the phenomenon of credentialling bloggers) raises serious questions of how the line between blogging and journalism will be maintained (or not maintained). Blogads are raising other issues about the independence of the voices in the blogosphere.

Meanwhile, Jack Balkin has turned over his blog to U of Maryland prof. Mark Graber, who like Mark Tushnet, seems to be taking the opportunity to excerpt his own forthcoming book. What's the deal with that?

Flintstones Hoax

Too often hackers and scam artists are betrayed by their own geekiness:
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Authorities Warn About Website Linked to Fake "Bedrock" Bank

Federal banking authorities put out an alert warning consumers to
steer clear of a website linked with the "First National Bank of Bedrock."
The bank claims to be based in Bedrock, Colo. But according to the Office
of the Comptroller of the Currency, the institution is as phony as the
town of Bedrock that "The Flintstones" call home.
     Read more:

(Source: Los Angeles Times)

Linux, Tigers, and Bears -- Oh My!

As we all prepare for Arnold's paean to bright shiny Republicanism this evening, we Californians are wondering what has he done for us lately? Perhaps the one interesting thing to emerge from Gov. Schwarzenegger's sounds-like-an-anti-doping-agency "California Performance Review Commission" is this:
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Proposal Urges California to Use More Open-Source Software

California lawmakers and administrators got an earful on open-source
software: A state government panel considered proposals that would boost
government use of Linux and other technologies. The proposals appear in a
lengthy report from the California Performance Review Commission, charged
by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger with figuring out how to make state
government work better and cheaper.
    
(Source: CNET News.com)
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Could this be related to this?

California Governments Sue Microsoft for Antitrust Violations
     Five California counties and two cities have filed a class-action
lawsuit against the software giant for using its monopoly power to deny
government agencies free choice in software products and charge high
prices. The legal action, filed by the city and county of San Francisco,
said that Microsoft's tactics caused harm to government users of its
Windows operating system and Word and Excel software.
     Read more:
http://www.gigalaw.com/newsarchives/2004_08_29_index2.html#109380184075427988
(Source: CNET News.com)

A Cancer is on the Prime-Ministership

In addition to making unsupported claims that the Australian election campaign may be interrupted by terrorist acts (proving himself a true member of the coalition), now Prime Minister Howard is in hot water for being a spammer:
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Australian Prime Minister Accused of Violating Spam Law in Campaign

Australian Prime Minister John Howard is at the centre of a growing
row over using unsolicited e-mails, or spam, to promote his election
campaign. Mr Howard hired his son's firm to send e-mails to voters in his
Sydney seat of Bennelong ahead of national elections expected in the
coming weeks.
    
(Source: BBC News)

Die-In at the Rep. Con.

I witnessed one of these die-ins at a talk by Douglas Daft of Coca-Cola last year at Yale. It was quite dramatic -- even though Daft went on unfazed. From the NYT's Christine Hauser:
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Protesters heeded calls for widespread, nonviolent civil disobedience in Manhattan today against Bush administration policies, with some antiwar demonstrators prepared to symbolically die as near as possible to the site of the Republican National Convention.

"We are going to be out there dressed in white, to stand out and be dramatic," said Ed Hedemann, an organizer of the War Resisters League, which describes itself as a secular, pacifist organization. "Probably by the end of our incarceration we will be grubby."

The league is one of several groups in the coalition making today, the second day of the convention at Madison Square Garden, one for mass but nonviolent civil disobedience. Known as A31, for August 31, the coalition scheduled a day of activities, including a subway action to represent those lost in "imperialist wars."

Mr. Hedemann said his group would wear white, an usual color for New York City, he admitted jokingly, where "there is a tendency to favor black."

But white was meant to convey mourning, and the more than 100 protesters he expected to join the demonstration would first gather at Ground Zero before heading north to Madison Square Garden.

While they would like to take their mass "die-in" to the convention floor, Mr. Hedemann had no illusions that his group would be able to breach the stringent security measures and the police presence.

So they will get as close as possible.

"At that point we will lie down on the street as if we had died from a bomb blast to symbolically represent people who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan," Mr. Hedemann said.
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Wise man Bill O'Reilly claims these types of protests will hurt Kerry. Now think about this means: either the protesters are bumbling Kerry supporters who have no concept of "negative publicity" -- or THEY'RE NOT REALLY KERRY SUPPORTERS, SO NOBODY SHOULD HOLD THEIR ACTIONS AGAINST KERRY. Right?

Bringing Out the Worst In All Of Us

Meghan O'Rourke points out at Slate that the Olympics brings out the worst in us, which David Miller's book "Athens to Athens" also makes in spades. Where has the racism of the 1912 and 1936 Olympics gone? Well, maybe it hasn't gone anywhere:
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Khorkina's Marie Antoinette-style imperiousness has repeatedly brought out a creepy puritanical streak in the NBC commentators�and I find it infuriating. "Our cameras continue to watch Svetlana Khorkina's every move, and that's just the way she likes it," NBC commentator Al Trautwig proclaimed. But Khorkina's demeanor was actually much more nuanced than the announcers would have you believe. Khorkina was bitter at the very end, but earlier in the evening she smiled with real, open pleasure throughout her floor routine. Besides, she should feel cheated in her drive to win an all-around Olympic title. During the all-around competition at the 2000 Olympics, her vault was set at the wrong height after a brilliant floor routine had put her in strong position for the gold medal. She fell and then, shaken, fell again on the uneven bars.

Bringing Out the Worst In Us

Meghan O'Rourke points out at Slate that the Olympics brings out the worst in us, which David Miller's book "Athens to Athens" also makes in spades. Where has the racism of the 1912 and 1936 Olympics gone? Well, maybe it hasn't gone anywhere:
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Khorkina's Marie Antoinette-style imperiousness has repeatedly brought out a creepy puritanical streak in the NBC commentators—and I find it infuriating. "Our cameras continue to watch Svetlana Khorkina's every move, and that's just the way she likes it," NBC commentator Al Trautwig proclaimed. But Khorkina's demeanor was actually much more nuanced than the announcers would have you believe. Khorkina was bitter at the very end, but earlier in the evening she smiled with real, open pleasure throughout her floor routine. Besides, she should feel cheated in her drive to win an all-around Olympic title. During the all-around competition at the 2000 Olympics, her vault was set at the wrong height after a brilliant floor routine had put her in strong position for the gold medal. She fell and then, shaken, fell again on the uneven bars.

The Limits of Certainty

Amidst the onslaught of Swift Vets charges and counter-charges, it's worth considering: 1) What is evidence?; 2) What kind of evidence should we demand from people making politically charged accusations against others? From a column written by Michael Kinsley last June:
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According to a Harris poll out Wednesday, a majority of Americans still think the Bush administration was telling the truth before the war when it said it had hard evidence of WMD. A Knight Ridder poll released last weekend reports that a third of the populace believes that the weapons have been discovered. A Fox News poll last week found that almost half of Americans feel that the administration was "intentionally misleading" about Iraq's weapons, but more than two-thirds think the war was justified anyway. A Gallup Poll released Wednesday concludes that almost 9 out of 10 Americans still think Saddam had or was close to having WMD.

By now, WMD have taken on a mythic role in which fact doesn't play much of a part. The phrase itself "weapons of mass destruction" is more like an incantation than a description of anything in particular. The term is a new one to almost everybody, and the concern it officially embodies was on almost no one's radar screen until recently. Unofficially, "weapons of mass destruction" are to George W. Bush what fairies were to Peter Pan. He wants us to say, "We DO believe in weapons of mass destruction. We DO believe. We DO." If we all believe hard enough, they will be there. And it's working.

The most striking thing about polls like these isn't how many people believe or disbelieve some unproven factual assertion or prediction, but how few give the only correct answer, which is "don't know." In the Fox News poll, vast majorities expressed certitude one way or the other about the existence of WMD in Iraq, the likelihood of peace in the Middle East, and so on. Those who voted "not sure" (an even more tempting cop-out than the pollsters' usual "don't know") rarely broke 20 percent and usually hovered around 10. Four-fifths or more were sure about everything.

As someone who manufactures opinions for a living, it is my job to be sure. And my standards for the ingredients of an opinion are necessarily low. There may be a few ancient pundits such as George Will who still follow the traditional guild practices: days in the library making notes on 3-by-5 cards, half a dozen lunches at the club with key sources, an hour spent alone in silence with a martini and one's thoughts and only then does a perfectly modulated opinion take its lovely shape. Most of us have no time for that anymore. It's a quick surf around the Net, a flip of the coin, and out pops an opinion, ready-to-go except perhaps for a bit of extra last-minute coarsening.

Still, even the most modern major generalist among the professional commentariat likes to have a little something in the way of knowledge as he or she scatters opinions like bird seed. The general public, or at least the part of it that deals with pollsters, is not so cowardly. Most people, it seems, will happily state a belief on a question of fact that nobody knows the answer to, and then just as happily do a double back flip from that shaky platform into a pool of opinions about which they are "sure."

Pollsters themselves, and the media who report their findings deadpan, are partly responsible for this. Every news report about a poll result reinforces the impression that opinion untethered to reality is valid or even patriotic (and to be "not sure" is shameful). The modern pundit culture is also partly to blame, I suppose, with its emphasis on televised argumentation. Viewers do not always grasp the difference between low standards and no standards at all.

Are there weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? Sure there are in every sense that matters, reality not being one of them.

Sansa-Whoosy-Whatsit?

Noy Thrupkaew argues that once you start lying to the public, you can't very well stop. Not that it'll help Bush win in November:

A little advice for the Bush administration: Don’t lie to us. That’s the one thing, guaranteed, that will bite you in your golf-pants– and Sansabelt-clad behinds. The American public really hates a prevaricator. While we know that thing about George Washington and the cherry tree isn’t strictly true, that’s a lie about lying that we like, a little piece of apocryphal mythology that, you know, holds up the illusion of a transparent and inclusive democracy.
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Er, what's a Sansabelt? Is that like Sunbelt (a swing-state thing)?