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this is the moment

that i stopped loving you

(everything in its right place)

The Israel Lobby

From two researchers from Harvard and Chicago University, a report on the Israel Lobby.

Though it is easy to dismiss talk of influence on the American government from foreign sources, especially with a country like Israel that we may inherently feel an ideological bond to, this paper does an excellent job of examining the United States foreign policy in the Middle East. The Middle East, as we know, has been a host to problems across the spectrum: corruption, violence, and zealotry have reigned supreme in the past fifty years. So in an arena marked by shades of greys, Mearsheimer & Walt do an excellent job of exposing how and why we have choosen our principle ally in the region.

By the numbers comes the greatest basis of support, right off the bat:

Since the October War in 1973, Washington has provided Israel with a level of support dwarfing that given to any other state. It has been the largest annual recipient of direct economic and military assistance since 1976, and is the largest recipient in total since World War Two, to the tune of well over $140 billion (in 2004 dollars). Israel receives about $3 billion in direct assistance each year, roughly one-fifth of the foreign aid budget, and worth about $500 a year for every Israeli. This largesse is especially striking since Israel is now a wealthy industrial state with a per capita income roughly equal to that of South Korea or Spain.

The thrust of the paper actually comes two paragraphs in:

Instead, the thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics, and especially the activities of the ‘Israel Lobby’. Other special-interest groups have managed to skew foreign policy, but no lobby has managed to divert it as far from what the national interest would suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US interests and those of the other country – in this case, Israel – are essentially identical.

And at the end, a powerful message about the affect when a lobbying group becomes too strong for our own good:

There is a ray of hope, however. Although the Lobby remains a powerful force, the adverse effects of its influence are increasingly difficult to hide. Powerful states can maintain flawed policies for quite some time, but reality cannot be ignored for ever. What is needed is a candid discussion of the Lobby’s influence and a more open debate about US interests in this vital region. Israel’s well-being is one of those interests, but its continued occupation of the West Bank and its broader regional agenda are not. Open debate will expose the limits of the strategic and moral case for one-sided US support and could move the US to a position more consistent with its own national interest, with the interests of the other states in the region, and with Israel’s long-term interests as well.

There is a full, unedited version of this paper available at Harvard.

dread the milky coming of the day

NYC. Went here. Kit, someone stole DaDa bot. I am not shitting you. The tables, the words, the colors. Everything. Even worse, it was some kraut. Probably some slob German efficiency-art Robot, with glass eyes behind neandrathal frames who thought they were replicating lower-case god with silent plagarism. I seriously hope this registers with you.

Ouch, get off me bitch!! I live with a psycho. You suck at life.

Went to Gray’s Papaya. It made you sick. Hot dogs are made of squirrels and horses and shoes. I think it was the shoes part that did you in.

I had a lot of time on the bus. There were no distractions, just silence. I miss you (bold you). Even a turn for the worse twists into a turn for the best. I seriously hope this registers with you.

Came back, felt a little non-sensical, a little cryptic. You probably wouldn’t get it, even if you had been there.

PREPARE FOR YUPPIE DEATH MARCH.

Oh, absolutely everythings changed

You toss and turn, but you can’t begin to get it back.

Well, apart from a few updates to Word of the Day, some abstract thinking on WPP, I haven’t done my part in keeping this site up. Kit (fortune for him, unfortunate for this site) has left for France for the next few months (hopefully I’ll get to visit!), and his brother remains the other steadfast contributor to PBH.

Anyway, I started a new job, am hopefully getting another position as well in the near future, and have been doing the standard yuppie death march towards the grave. I have the pictures to prove it too (they’re here).

I suggest you check out Internet Vibes — they’re vibes are seriously out of control. Also, SixSixFive, Coming Anarchy, and Warcraft 3 have been keeping me entertained recently. It is a sad day.

Call Out

this is the dead-end lifestyle we lead:

you lavish yourself with expensive gifts, pay a rediculously expensive rent,flaunt your UVA hat as much as possible…..all this for what. To live paycheck to paycheck spending each one of your miserable days infront of a fucking spreadsheet, completely alienating yourself from whats really going on. And then you get your big reward, when you get to go out every weekend and talk about the most trivial shit with a bunch of yuppie fucks while drinking your overpriced vodka and tonics and stare and unnactractive girls and then go home and JO to them while you put warcraft on pause.