Update:She resigned, probably because she was told that she could either resign or be fired.
If she doesn’t resign, she should be fired.
Free speech is a thing, and as such she had the right to say what she did. If she had been a member of the US Republican Party, her words would have helped her reputation within her party. But she is not a member of a proto-fascist right-wing party. She is a member of a social-democratic government. Social democracy has generally been critical of imperialism.
As a minister in such a government, she had to watch her words, as should any minister in any government. If she didn’t like that, she shouldn’t have gone into politics.
Her apology said almost all of the right words. It’s just that two critically important words — “I resign” — are missing. If she was really as concerned about her previously unquestioned beliefs as she claims to be, she would want to step back from power for a while to reexamine those beliefs.
But she did not do so. As such, the so-called “apology” comes across as just that: the insincere words of someone desperately trying to cling to her position of political power.
It is a general principle of politics, going back to the time of Plato, that they who most desire power for power’s sake are those least worthy of holding it.
To reiterate: Selena Robinson should resign. If she doesn’t resign, she should be fired.
That is to say, how will the United States Supreme Court rule on whether or not the 14th Amendement bars Trump from running for president?
Anyone claiming that the Court’s conservatives “have to” rule against Trump because of the doctrine of originalism is a rank idiot who does not know even the most elementary basics about politics. Would it be hypocritical to suddenly forget about originalism the instant it becomes politically inconvenient? Of course it would! But so what?
To reiterate, anyone arguing that hypocrisy makes taking a position impossible is an idiot. Such an individual knows nothing about politics in general and right-wing politics in particular. If hypocrisy played no role in politics, politics would be so radically different as to be virtually incomprehensible.
The right-wing justices could rule in Trump’s favour with the greatest of ease, and without the slightest of hesitation, and the political right would loudly celebrate the ruling as a great blow for the cause of justice. Any attempts to point out the hypocrisy of it all would go exactly nowhere with the right. As Upton Sinclair once observed: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!”
The question is not whether they “have to” in the name of some imaginary principle against hypocrisy, but whether or not they will rule against Trump as a virtue of some other principle (which, given human nature, will most likely be one grounded in self-interest). And this is far more difficult to say.
On the one hand, ruling in Trump’s favour helps their political team win. And make no mistake: that would be the calculus behind the ruling. There would of course be a lot of verbiage about higher principles, but that would be a mere pretext cooked up to justify the desired action, nothing more.
If they do rule for Trump, a ruling based on the pretext of due process is most likely. That is, it will be argued that the 14th Amendment is co-equal with the 5th Amendment, and that as such the guarantees of due process in the latter still apply. Trump has not been found guilty of any seditious crimes, and therefore he will be ruled an eligible candidate.
On the other hand, Trump is acting more and more like an aspiring dictator, and dictators are never friendly to the idea of an independent judiciary. And here we have another team to consider: the judiciary in general. Government bureaucracies are many and varied, but they all have a common thread: they want to preserve themselves and their power. Those right-wing justices may be on the right, but they are also part of the judiciary branch, and want to see that branch continue to be powerful and relevant in national politics.
That this incentive exists, and could act to frustrate the evolution of tyranny, is no accident. From Federalist 51 (emphasis added):
It is equally evident, that the members of each department should be as little dependent as possible on those of the others, for the emoluments annexed to their offices. Were the executive magistrate, or the judges, not independent of the legislature in this particular, their independence in every other would be merely nominal. But the great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others. The provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack. Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.
If the Court’s conservatives rule against Trump, this, not originalism, is likely to be the most powerful motivator. Oh, sure, originalism will dovetail nicely with such a ruling, and that will make the conservative justices ruling so pleased with it. I am sure they will wax eloquent about originalism in that ruling, and they will do this while remaining silent about sticking up for their own power. Professed motives should never be confused with actual ones.
So this, then, is the real question: how will the justices perceive the butter on their toast? If they perceive it to be buttered on the side of a second Trump presidency advancing their interests, they will rule for Trump. If they perceive the opposite, they will rule oppositely. And there is no easy way to say ahead of time which it will be.
And the minister is correct: If, as Israel is, one is the best friend of a superpower, the Court is fundamentally meaningless. It has no means of enforcing its decisions, and courts without power to enforce their rulings might as well not exist. International law is for lesser nations (i.e. non-superpowers and best friends of same). Anyone with any doubt of this should research The Republic of Nicaragua vs. The United States of America (1986).
The key problem is, most of the world doesn’t really give a shit about Palestine. Oh, favourable noises might get made on that issue from time to time, but when it comes to anyone with any sort of power making a significant effort to actualize anything, it almost never happens. And before you say “Houthis,” please watch this.
Basically, unless China and Russia decide their toast is buttered on the side of weighing in hard on the side of Palestine (and so far they have not), the Palestinians don’t really have much grounds for hope anytime soon. Nothing motivates like self-interest, and if China and/or Russia would decide to exploit this conflict to undermine US authority, the USA might be motivated (by the desire to not lose further prestige) to act in more humanitarian interests. But since the precondition for the latter is absent, it is unlikely to happen. So the near term is bleak.
In the longer term, the bloodshed in Gaza is likely to exacerbate and continue the long decline in the State of Israel’s reputation that began with its decision to colonize lands occupied in the wake of the 1967 Six-Day War. Pair that with the growing trend towards right-wing authoritarianism in Israel, and you have a long-term vulnerability.
Those who care about Palestine would be wise to continue pushing on those vulnerabilities. Israel has done much to tarnish its own reputation, and that tarnish should be pointed out at every opportunity. The recent ICJ ruling, and Israel’s contemptuous dismissal of it, is part of that tarnish. That, and only that, is the significance of the ruling.
I was, for much of the 1990’s, involved in activism on the subject of East Timor, which was then considered to be the canonical lost cause. Indonesia, a US client state, had occupied the former Portuguese territory in flagrant violation of international law in 1975, and had waged a genocidal war in an attempt to subdue its population into accepting Indonesian rule. Attempts to resolve the issue went nowhere because Indonesia was a US client state. But, over time, the small group I was involved with managed to point out how tarnished Indonesia was as a result of its atrocities in East Timor, and Indonesia’s reputation began slipping in Congress.
Then the whole house of cards suddenly collapsed. Indonesia experienced a sudden economic crisis that revealed just how thoroughly corrupt the authoritarian government there was. Suharto, Indonesia’s dictator, went cap in hand to his superpower benefactor, but thanks to reputation damage, a prompt bailout was not forthcoming. The economic crisis then provoked widespread popular unrest that drove Suharto from power. The new government agreed to allow East Timor to become independent if it wanted, in return for much-needed economic aid.
The latter was only possible because of slow, patient, seemingly futile work for years prior. Reputation is just touchy-feely stuff that doesn’t much matter… until, suddenly, it does.
It has long been a protest chant that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
Then the “genocide” rhetoric began leaking out of rallies in the streets. Early last month, Canadian MP Don Davies attracted a fair bit of attention when he tweeted:
You will note that I have posted that as a screen shot of a tweet, to which I have not linked. There is a reason for this.
Unfortunately for Davies, he really didn’t have much evidence to go on for those rather shocking assertions of his. He initially tried to pull a bait-and-switch by repeatedly posting excerpts from an (unreferenced) article talking about how “The [Israel Defence Force] Military Intelligence Directorate is using artificial intelligence and automated tools to ‘produce reliable targets quickly and accurately….'”
Sorry, no. So the Israeli military is selecting targets. Big surprise there. There is a war going on. In war, belligerents target each other, i.e. they select what to attack. The quotes merely support the claim that the IDF is engaged in target selection and that they are using artificial intelligence software in doing so. Nowhere are the criteria for target selection mentioned.
Jews were, of course, one of the main the victims of one of the worst (and certainly the most famous) genocides in history: the Holocaust unleashed by the Nazis. Part of the reason Zionism succeeded in its goal of creating a Jewish state was how this genocide showed the validity of the Zionist argument that Jews needed a state of their own to serve as a refuge during times of persecution. Plus, false allegations of Jewish atrocities against non-Jews served as pretexts for the Holocaust. As such, false claims of genocide really strike a nerve with many Jews.
Not surprisingly, Davies’ responses flew about as well as the original claim did. He then deleted the original tweet, and made a fresh tweet with claims better supported by available evidence.
As the most famous genocide in history, the Holocaust colours the popular conception of what a genocide is. As such, that conception goes something like: “collecting as many members of an ethnic group as you can in ghettos and concentration camps, and then systematically murdering them.” If this is the definition of genocide, then clearly Israel is not committing genocide. Yes, Israel is reducing Gaza to rubble. The Allies reduced Germany and Japan to rubble in World War II, yet the Allies are not generally considered to be guilty of genocide as a result.
But that is a mere popular conception and popular conceptions have no legal standing. That is important, as the accusations of genocide have now made their way into the International Court of Justice. There, the case depends on how “genocide” is defined under international law. The relevant document here is the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, commonly referred to simply as the “genocide convention.” That document defines the term thusly (all emphasis added):
In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
It seems clear to me that what Israel is doing falls afoul of the first three clauses of the definition. Don’t blame me, I didn’t come up with the above definition. I am merely reporting its existence.
And this is why South Africa has been able to plausibly make its case in front of the ICJ.
Of course, what the Allies did to Japan and Germany would also easily qualify. And now we are back to popular conceptions again. Such conceptions may not have any legal standing, yet they still matter, as ultimately it will be public pressure that plays a key role in stopping the bloodshed currently going on in Gaza.
The New York-based CPJ said at least 68 journalists and other media workers had been killed in Gaza, Israel and southern Lebanon since the Hamas cross-border attack on 7 October and subsequent Israeli assault.
“More journalists have been killed in the first 10 weeks of the Israel-Gaza war than have ever been killed in a single country over an entire year,” it said.
“CPJ is particularly concerned about an apparent pattern of targeting of journalists and their families by the Israeli military. In at least one case, a journalist was killed while clearly wearing press insignia in a location where no fighting was taking place. In at least two other cases, journalists reported receiving threats from Israeli officials and Israel Defense Forces officers before their family members were killed.”
Note that the CPJ is a pretty middle of the road press freedom organization that doesn’t generally take much of a side (besides that of protecting journalists) in any cultural or ideological struggles. So if they are willing to go out and accuse Israel of something like that, they must believe it has actually happened. What Israel is accused of is certainly pretty war-crimey, but is it genocide? Probably not, but it is finally some support for part of what Davies was alleging in his now-deleted tweet.
In contrast, this sounds a whole lot closer to both popular and legalistic definitions of genocide:
Aid organizations say all of Gaza’s universities have been partially or completely destroyed by the Israeli offensive, including the Islamic, Open Arab, and Al-Azhar universities.
Most recently, the Israeli military carried out the demolition of Al Israa University in southern Gaza with explosives Jan. 17. It was videotaped by the Israel Defense Forces and distributed to Israeli media, prompting the Biden administration to ask Israel for clarification for the reasons for its destruction.
The IDF said in a press statement this week that it was investigating the approval process for the demolition.
Going after the cultural institutions of a people like this is, after all, something the Nazis did to their victims. They burned synagogues, torched Jewish libraries, and levelled Jewish cemeteries. In Poland (the Nazis were anti-Slavic as well), the Nazi occupiers deliberately targeted Polish culture, dissolving universities and prohibiting Poles, under penalty of death, from acquiring more than the most basic of educations.
So yes, there probably is genocide going on in Gaza, and South Africa’s case has merit.
How likely any International Court of Justice ruling is to actually change anything will be the subject of a future post.
Having been granted permanent residency in Canada, I will be selling my Bellingham condo soon. This whole move north has in some ways been fortuitous: there are not many condos available in Bellingham, and what is available is generally carpeted and with clauses in the deed requiring carpeting for its soundproofing qualities.
The problem with carpet is allergies; there are two types of carpeting:
Old carpet full of dirt and allergens.
New carpet that outgasses toxic chemicals.
I began my ownership with the condo in the first state, and two years ago invested in bringing it to the second state. I did a significant amount of research in trying to select carpeting that outgassed less. It didn’t matter: it still outgassed to an excessive degree. Fortuitously, it was about two years ago that I got my job offer in Canada, so I never had to deal with what to do about the whole situation (absent the job offer, there were no good solutions).
Now, there is an excellent solution: Just sell it. Pristine carpeting will be a selling point.
That begs the question of whether or not to use the proceeds to purchase a condo in the Vancouver region. The answer is probably not, at least not now.
It’s sort of ironic, as the big problem with condos in Bellingham is not so much of an issue here; carpeting just isn’t as popular in Vancouver. I think this has to do with the high proportion of immigrants in Vancouver; carpeting is not as popular outside of North America, and the market is simply catering to overall demand.
Alas, there are other problems with the condo market here.
Money is probably the biggest one. If you divide the list price of a condo by the yearly rent of an equivalent apartment, you get about 29. The rule of thumb is home ownership seldom makes economic sense unless that ratio is 15 or less.
So absent a strong economic case, some other case must be made. Several possible cases exist:
Stability in general
It is hard to be evicted from a property you own. Unfortunately for this argument, British Columbia has strong tenant protection laws: it is hard to be evicted from a rental. Easiest way for my landlord to push me out would be if he wants to move into my unit himself or move an immediate family member into it. My unit is so small that he and his wife are unlikely to want it. It contains stairs, so it is unlikely to be appealing to an elderly parent. In other words, I am likely to be able to stay here indefinitely long.
Price stability
On top of that, one of those tenant protections is rent control. By contrast, Canada lacks long-term mortgages, for the simple reason that the federal government here has never taken the sort of policy to create them (long-term loans like 30-year mortgages are something a market will never create on its own. So any financing I undertake will be limited term, and have to be renewed (typically, after five years), possibly at a much higher interest rate.
Quiet
My current rental is a so-called laneway house, a small, detached dwelling unit behind the main house. I share no common walls with anyone. I am in a completely residential area on a quiet side street. The only way to do as good as this with a condo would be to find one in a cottage development, but such developments are extraordinarily rare here.
Ham radio aspects
It would be nice if I could erect a few antennas. I have done that in other condos by hiding antennas in the attic space. Another alternative would be a penthouse condo with a roof I could climb up to from my deck. Both of these are in the strict sense forbidden, but if one is discreet about it, one can in my experience get away with it. The sort of tower developments popular here mean only a minute fraction of units are top floor units, and that those units sell at a disproportionate premium. (Being on the top floor is also critical from a quiet standpoint; I have lived under simply too many people who apparently keep a pet rhino that they attempting to teach how to tap dance.)
The bottom line is that a condo purchase could make sense if I find something reasonably-priced on the top floor with some sort of roof or attic access. Such units do exist, but they are almost always in older buildings, and these have several problems:
Smoking
Before the 2000’s, it was unusual for condos to restrict smoking. Condos are not airtight. Have a smoker as a neighbour and it is likely that their stink will intrude your unit. In my case, this raises allergy issues.
Laundry
Older condos tend not to have in-unit washers and dryers. I am allergic or sensitive to most scented laundry products, which makes wearing clothes washed in shared machines problematic. Yes, even the residue from a previous usage can make clothing effectively unwearable to me, causing itching, rashes, and migraines. This has caused me significant issues when I have had to contend with shared laundry facilities, to the point that the only reasonable conclusion is that having my own private laundry facility a must.
The exterior building envelope
There was a huge spate of shoddy condo designs built in the late twentieth century in British Columbia, to the point that the leaky condo crisis has at times been a significant political issue here. Buying an older condo that has not already been renovated to correct this issue is taking on a significant risk.
The bottom line is that the available facts seem to indicate that owing my home simply does not make much sense in this region.
This may change in the next five years or so, however. A number of of zoning changes have been made or are underway that make it reasonable to suspect that a batch of smaller condo developments are about to be built in residential areas, and that some of these will take the form of accessory dwelling units (like the one I currently inhabit) being offered for separate purchase. That would change the calculus significantly. Such changes are, however, at this point only theoretical.
So unless I really get lucky, the best answer for the time being is almost certainly to continue renting.
When I wrote this, I had not, in fact, caught all the mice.
Signs of mouse activity quickly resumed. Then began the game of strategically redeploying traps in an attempt to catch the other ones. A week later, I caught one in a trap baited with a piece of a walnut. Then began a further week with continued high mouse activity and no caught mice.
Eventually, the idea to try a different sort of bait occurred to me: something savoury, greasy, and meaty. I had heard that sometimes mice go for such things, so I borrowed a handful of dry dog food from a friend and left a piece of kibble out in an area of the kitchen with particularly high mouse activity. Within four hours, the kibble was gone.
So I promptly re-baited two traps with dog kibble that had been baited with Tootsie Roll (of which I had read can attract mice, but which these mice showed approximately zero interest in). The traps were ignored. So I made a trail of kibble bits leading to one of the traps. The mouse ate the trail and left the trap alone. So I left another trail, this time ending closer to the trigger. The same thing happens. Try a third time, this time ending under the trigger, since that type of old-fashioned snap trap can be tripped by lifting the trigger as well as depressing it. The trail gets eaten except for that last little kibble bit under the trigger.
It was at this point I nicknamed the offending mouse “Einstein,” because it had apparently managed to learn how mousetraps work. I complain to the landlord and get him to redouble his efforts at sealing off all entrances, and to seek the services of a professional exterminator.
A few days later, I get the idea of swapping out the bait in another trap in another area with high mouse activity for a piece of dog kibble. This is also wooden snap trap but it has a wide plastic trigger instead of a traditional metal one. Because there is no easy way to tie bait to this trigger with a piece of wire, I just place the kibble atop the trigger. Einstein promptly steals the bait, leaving the trap untripped.
So I try again, this time hot-melt gluing the bait onto the trigger. If you have ever observed a small rodent eat, you will notice that they prefer to do so by standing on their hind legs and holding the food in their front paws while they nibble on it. I figure the mouse will want to do that, which will lead to tugging on the stuck bait and a hopefully sprung trap.
And at long last, my newfound optimism at a new strategy is borne out. The same night that happens, a second mouse visits one of my other traps baited with walnut and gets caught by it. So I go from a week with no success to two dead mice in a single night.
That was now a little over a week ago, and there has been no sign of any new mouse activity since then. So I now feel reasonably safe concluding that my mouse problem is probably over, at least for this season.
Some takeaways:
Peanut butter is not always best. It is reputed to be the best bait, and virtually every source out there about dealing with mice recommends it highly. Well, these mice showed exactly zero interest in peanut butter. If, after a few days, you have no success with peanut butter, it is probably best to start considering other bait types.
Watch what they nibble on. One of my catches was in a trap baited with granola, since I had noticed an old, reused granola bag get nibbled on by a mouse.
Try similar baits. Peanut butter never worked, but that got me to try another type of nut butter (sunflower). That didn’t work, either, but it led me to try walnuts. Half of the mice I caught were in traps baited with walnut pieces.
Try dog food or jerky. Some mice like meaty, savoury things. A mouse that showed zero interest in any other type of bait came for dog food.
Multiple traps are good. Anywhere you see signs of mouse activity is a good place for at least one trap. No area with signs of mouse activity should be more than a few feet from a trap.
Multiple types of trap are good. These mice never came to any of those newer-style “improved” plastic traps, ever. The only traps that caught mice for me were old-fashioned wooden traps. Of those, Victor makes some with a new-style wide plastic triggers. Those were by far the most successful type, catching three of the four mice. I would have never learned this, and would probably still be struggling with a mouse infestation, had I not been willing to try different trap types.
When using old-fashioned wooden traps, leave nothing to chance. The disadvantage of these traps, and the motive for most improvements on them, is that if the mouse approaches from the back and sometimes the side, it will evade the kill zone even if the trap goes off. Such traps must be placed inside a little box, or between objects arranged so as to guide the mouse into the kill zone, to maximize their chance of success. Likewise, solid baits should be affixed to the trigger by gluing or tying with fine wire to promote tugging and minimize the chance of bait theft.
Incrementalism can be helpful. I never caught Einstein until I first baited a trap with a new bait and did not secure the bait. This probably taught the mouse the lesson that it was possible to steal from a trap of this design with this bait. On the second visit, when the mouse’s guard was down, the bait had been glued to the trigger. No more easy lifting. Snap!
Exclusion is key. I do not think it is a coincidence that I caught two mice in one night right after the landlord redoubled his efforts at closing all possible avenues of rodent ingress and egress. I believe this trapped two mice inside, and once they realized they could no longer go outdoors to feed on garbage (I have been meticulous about cleaning up crumbs), there was no ready food source left for them save the bait on my traps.
The verdict is out (as much as there can be such a thing), and Israel almost certainly committed war crimes in its attacks on al-Shifa, which were not justified.
Yes, there was some evident Hamas tunnel infrastructure found on the hospital grounds, as I mentioned here about a month ago. However:
Contrary to Israeli and US claims, it was not located beneath any hospital buildings. The entry that was in a building, was in an outbuilding near the edge of the hospital grounds, which was not being directly used for medical purposes.
Contrary to Israeli and US claims, the infrastructure was of limited size, far less extensive than the sort of major command centre that was alleged to be there.
There is no evidence that the Hamas infrastructure was actively being used at the time.
The article referenced in the initial link here goes into the details.
Finally, this is precisely the sort of war crime one would expect Israel to commit, based on past behaviour patterns. Israel did not know for certain that the hospital was being misused for military purposes (if they actually had better evidence going in, we would now have abundant evidence of a major command centre beneath the hospital buildings). Rather, what happened is that Israel decided to take risks based on scanty evidence with the lives of a people that it has already decided are basically expendable. It is not deliberately intending to massacre civilians, but the end result tends to be substantially the same.
Comparing the war crimes of the two sides is a bit like comparing apples and oranges: they are fundamentally different, but both are still of the same general category.
So, Israeli soldiers shot and killed three hostages who were trying to surrender, waving a white flag. It has now emerged that, moreover, the hostages were shirtless. In other words, clearly unarmed.
Shooting an unarmed group of people waving a white flag is, of course, a flagrant and blatant war crime.
It gets worse when one asks why they did it. The most logical explanation is that they didn’t realize they were shooting Israeli hostages. This is so obviously axiomatic that I feel a bit silly typing it.
So in other words, they did it because they thought they were shooting unarmed Palestinians.
Which, of course, begs the question of how many other war crimes are being committed. The number is likely to be significant.
For about the past fortnight, there has been an unwanted house guest living on my first floor.
Late this morning, returning from an errand, I finally was greeted with the sight I have been hoping to see for all too long: a sprung mouse trap with a dead rodent in it. As luck would have it, part of the errand was procuring a live-catch trap (since I was having zero luck with the snap traps, and have read that the live-catch traps have a higher capture rate).
Regarding the latter point, this mouse evaded capture in a snap trap not once, not twice, not thrice, but a total of four times. I guess the critter finally let its guard down enough to let one of my traps catch it.
At least, I sure hope I caught the mouse. I.e., that there is not more than one furry little home invader to deal with. The new morning ritual of cleaning up the mouse poop has gotten very old. I am going to play it safe and hold off on returning the live-catch trap unused until at least a week passes with no sign of mouse activity.
On a related note, I have finally stopped getting nothing but the silent treatment out of the various job applications I have been sending out. Hopefully catching the mouse is a good sign that my luck has turned and I will catch a job as well. We shall see. It won’t ruin my life for this to be false optimism; I have enough saved up to be able to go without a job for a while, and the time off will be a good way to recharge.
