| pornpf69 |
12-18-2004 12:24 PM |
In Action
"The relationship between the Palestinians and the rise of Al Qaeda, between Arafat and the rise of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, needs to be deconstructed. Our whole 'war on terror' (and of terror) will continue to be quixotic, if not self-destructive, if we don't take the opportunity of the Palestinian Authority president's death to set a new course, not based on a personality but on history and the needs of the region. At least a pinch of the salt of our own ideals in the soup of the Mideast wouldn't hurt either. And I don't mean force-fed 'democracy.'
I met Arafat in Beirut on the brink of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, the event Bin Laden referred to -- with portent few caught -- in his missive to the West just before the U.S. presidential election."
Gregory Orfalea. 'Snuffing Radical Islam's Fire,' The Los Angeles Times (December 12, 2004).
"Alongside those missives from friends and that drudgery from the office is a cast of e-mail characters with fantastic names promising all manner of stuff for sale. Frequently the promises are bogus; virtually all of the names are, too.
Though it seems impossible to imagine the unwanted e-mail known as spam as anything but a nuisance, there is something creative about these return addresses -- even if they are being used for untoward purposes. On Web bulletin boards, they are sometimes draw admiring observations."
Lisa Napoli. "Yours Not So Truly, J. Goodspam," The New York Times (February 5, 2004).
"One priority was the tacit acknowledgment of what this particular entertainer, an orphan who came from nothing, represented. The preponderance of black faces both days bore witness to a deep recognition: Without this blind/colorblind musician?s bridge building -- from gospel to R&B to jazz to pop and even to country -- during the crucial period of the ?50s and ?60s civil rights movement, American integration would have been an even tougher slog. Stevie Wonder got murmurs of approval when he said, 'Ray was not able to outlive hate and injustice'; Wonder?s unfettered vocal skyrocketing on 'I Won?t Complain' had everybody?s eyes misting. Even Clint Eastwood?s stiff tribute -- to Charles the entertainer, Charles the teacher and Charles the worker -- resonated with real substance.
But there was stranger stuff going on, too; the funeral felt like a platform for penitence and forgiveness. The Rev. Jesse Jackson couldn?t preach 'The corruptible shall put on incorruption' without raising images of his own extramarital paternity. The reading of a missive from Bill Clinton (whom Jackson counseled during the Lewinsky mess) smelled like free publicity for a confessional new book. And when multiple felon Glen Campbell strapped on his guitar to stir a clapping throng with 'Where Could I Go but to the Lord?' -- well, he had all of our synapses firing with that one."
Greg Burk. "Ray Charles Hits the Road," LA Weekly (June 25-July 1, 2004).
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