When Facebook Memes Attack!

"The "Rules" : Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you. Copy and paste this and then go to the notes section of your profile."

1. My body's sleep schedule seems to run on a 25-hour rhythm. If I have no pressing reason to get up for an extended period of time, I'll be waking up at 9am, then 1pm, then 4pm, then eventually later, until it cycles all the way back.

2. I'm in the Army reserves. It's like no other job on this planet.

3. English is my second language.

4. I'm the only person I know that shaves with a straight razor. They've got a bitch of learning curve, but once you're through it, the result is phenomenal.

5. Apparently, I was "Most Promiscuous Brother" of AEPi's Ottawa chapter, 2007/2008. There was a vote. For once, I abstained.

6. Karaoke is my guilty pleasure.

7. I don't leave answering machine messages. There's no reason why, I just don't. I've probably left 5 in the last year.

8. I've had my M2 license since I was 16. If I don't do my final road test soon, it's going to expire.

9. I procrastinate. It's ridicu... fuck it.

10. I'm teaching myself - slowly - guitar.

11. Songs that recurringly get stuck in my head:
"Proud Mary," Ike and Tina Turner
"City Blues," Brian Wilson and Eric Clapton
"You Can't Hurry Love," either the Phil Collins cover or The Supremes' original.

12. Dvorjak and Dr Dre are next to each other in my iTunes. My taste is eclectic.

13. I've been to Israel 15 times, and I'm STILL eligible for Birthright.

14. I put all my private thoughts in a blog, but I don't share it with people I know in real life. Tried that once, it didn't go well; for their own good, nobody should ever know what I'm actually thinking.

15. When I have the time, I take hot showers that last easily 45 minutes, sometimes 60. I'm not even masturbating in there, just chillin'.

16. Questionable Content. Favourite web comic.

17. If I've got the time, the money, and the means, I have never turned down a road trip.

18. I've been to the fundamentalist Christian "Creation Museum" in Kentucky. Great shit.

19. I've been arrested.
Once.
While on a public bench.
For trespassing.

20. I love my bathrobe. It's big and purple, and I'm wearing it right now. I take it anywhere I'm staying for more than a night. I've driven across Tennessee in it, and I was the one driving.

21. I've elevated public nudity to high art, and I don't have to be drunk to streak.

22. My addiction, aside from nicotine, alcohol, and carnal sin, is raw oyster. Sit me down in front of them, and I'll eat oysters until you run out of shellfish, or I run out of money.

23. My cell phone and laptop don't get turned off.

24. I'm swearing off Hamilton Karaoke bars for at least two weeks. Those of you who were there know my reasons.

25. I am the least organized person you will ever meet. At my last place, all my floorspace went missing.

26. I'm terrible at math.

27. I'm invisible.

From the Huffington Post Commentariat

...I think that just about sums up my views on the matter. I'm strongly in favour of a two-state solution, provided that such a Palestinian state actually held peaceful coexistence as a goal. Unfortunately, when the governing party holds as part of its constitutional charter a clause to completely eradicate the nation of Israel, with everyone in it, I have trouble imagining that party acting in good faith towards long-term peace.

Israel, on the other hand, has shown - in deeds, not just in words - that it is willing to make real concessions when across a table from a viable peace partner. When Egyptian president Anwar Sadat offered a treaty in good faith, Israel ceded the entire Sinai Peninsula to Egypt in exchange for a peace accord - a piece of land at least 2 or 3 times larger than Israel itself, and containing most of the oil that was then under Israeli control.

Israel was willing to exchange to Egypt a huge amount of land and a moderate amount of natural resources because Egypt came to the bargaining table seeking peace in good faith.

Yet Israel wants to keep the Gaza Strip - a useless little wastelend, out of territorial greed? No, it's because it hasn't seen any reason to believe that a nascent Palestinian state wouldn't become a sovereign staging ground for more attacks against nearby Israeli towns.

The Palestinians would have a state already if their leaders showed a desire for a peaceful two-state solution. I agree completely with Benjamin Netanyahu on this point: "If the Palestinians would lay down their arms there would be peace. If the Israelis laid down their arms, there would be no Israel."

For peace, concessions cannot come from only one side.



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Edit, 30 Dec 2008, 10:51am:

A Jerusalem Post article describes a higher statistic for civilian casualties than I'd previously quoted, with UN numbers as a source. I don't know what accounts for the difference in estimates quoted by the two sources (15 civilian casualties in the Wired article v. 64 in the JPost article), but the real number probably lies somewhere in between that four and eighteen percent.

It may be a simple matter of differences in who is considered a non-civilian: do you count someone involved in transporting or manufacturing Hamas rockets, or only those who have a gun in their hands?

Even if the count lies closer to the higher quoted number, my opinion has changed very little: keeping civilian casualties below even 18% when striking military targets embedded within an urban population shows fairly clearly that Israel is devoting significant attention and resources to ensuring that civilian casualties are minimized. Those who like to say that Israel is targeting civilians should probably rethink a few things.