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Dec 27, 2009

Israel Shamir Meets Cynthia McKinney

 

Dec. 28, 2009

From Cynthia Mckinney:

In Ankara, the capital of Turkey, in the course of defending the cause of Palestine, I've met with wonderful Cynthia McKinney, who would be the best president for the US. After this fateful meeting, she wrote to her list:

I can hardly believe this moment!!  Israel Shamir has written about me and lifted my spirits when I was most down.  Even from faraway Israel, he understood my plight and dared give voice to the truth.  They say that sometimes distance gives clarity--and certainly in Israel's case, in observing my serial targeting, he saw what many inside the United States could not see.  Despite his writings, I never met him until this moment, just a few minutes ago!!  We are speaking together this afternoon in Ankara, Turkey.  He has already sent his message out on his list and so I include it here for you.  I will send my message to you later.  I will bring these contacts from around the world that I have made on behalf of peace, home to the United States so that we can more easily achieve our objectives for justice and peace and dignity in the area of policy where we and the world need it the most.  We are a part of something much bigger than us individually, and our moment is now.

From Israel Shamir:

I add to it now what I wrote about Cynthia a few years ago:

 

Ode to Cynthia

By Israel Shamir

 

Things must be bad indeed if a woman steps forward to the line of fire. Nature arranged that a woman does not court danger unless her land and her folks are in real trouble. But when she does, she teaches men a lesson of manly behaviour.

When France was fading away, a shepherd girl Jeanne d'Arc took a heavy sword and led the flower of French nobles to assault the walls of Orleans. When cities of Republican Spain was strafed by the Nazi Luftwaffe, it was a woman, Dolores Ibarruri, La Pasionaria, who said to her people: it is better to die tall, than to live on your knees. In 1990, when Mikhail Gorbachev led his country to disaster and disintegration, a year before the wealth of Russia was embezzled in privatisation spree, only one person has dared to raise her voice against the dictator in the parliament. She was the indomitable Sashie Umalatov, an MP from the Chechen Mountains.

Now it is the turn of the US to feel the chilly wind of eternity on its face. It came from unexpected direction. People of America became hostage in the hands of a few men with too many dollars in their pockets and endless greed in their hearts. For millennia, the difference of income, education, and standard of living was not so vast in one land. The wealth of the nation could provide every American with a superb education, perfect medical care, happy childhood, secure old age, guaranteed home, and free time to open one's mind to new thoughts and old friends. America could be on its way to the Golden Age of universal happiness and wisdom.

Instead of it, a small group of men squeezes the nation in order to add another billion to their coffers. They would surely destroy the US by their limitless greed. The devotees of Mammon, they are totally devoid of compassion to the people they live amongst. They do not see the local people as 'their own kind'. If they want to show compassion, they send money to Israel. Out of five dollars American taxpayer gives for aid, four dollars land in the coffers of the Jewish state. They appear unstoppable, as the politicians are scared of them and docilely raise their hands and sign the pledge promising to send more money to Israeli generals. Support of Israel is not a foreign policy. It is the covenant of the Mammonites, and you sign it with blood. With Palestinian blood.

But one woman refused to sign the pledge. One woman, Cynthia McKinney, a member for Georgia, dared to refuse. Four hundred congressmen signed it; they preferred their own personal advancement to the good of the country. Ancestors of Cynthia were slaves in her native Georgia. But she is one of a very few free persons in the US Congress. As we Israelis were used to say about our Golda Meir, she is the only man over there. She is a black woman, but she is the whitest man of them all, they would say before the Politically Correct era. She knew the billions of Israeli aid are needed for the poor people of the United States, for her own Afro-American community. She wanted to uphold the sovereignty of the people and congress of the United States, in face of encroaching servility to the Jewish Lobby.

She is not alone. Another wonderful Afro-American congresswoman, Barbara Lee, cast the only vote against the slaughter in Afghanistan; John Conyers, Jessie Jackson Jr, and Maxine Waters supported the cause of Palestine on different occasions. Ron Paul of Texas voted against all-house resolution sending obsequious greeting to General Sharon. Nick Rahall, John Sununu, David Bonior did not bend.

Cynthia was just more outspoken in seeing the evil. She said[i], "There are many Members of Congress who want to be free. I am one of them. I wanted to be free to vote according to my conscience, but I had been told that if I didn't sign a pledge supporting the military superiority of Israel, no support would come my way. And sure enough, I didn't sign the pledge and no support came my way. I suffered silently year in and year out, because I refused to sign that pledge. And then, like a slave that found a way to buy his freedom... I went to work ... I wanted to be free ... Free to cast the votes in the United States Congress as I saw fit and not as I was dictated to".

Now she stands for re-election, and her chances are dim, as the frightful AIPAC, the spearhead of the organised Jewish community, targeted her. They do not want to see independent and free congressmen on the Capitol Hill. Their huge financial might, network of connections in the media and universities are used to smother every free voice. They succeeded to unseat Earl Hilliard, another Black Congressman, who did not bow to Sharon, and now plan to do Cynthia in. If they succeed, the cause of freedom will suffer a huge setback. If she succeeds, the myth of Jewish omnipotence will evaporate, and America will look towards better days, as support or rejection of segregated Israel speaks volumes about true agenda of a candidate.

Cynthia is not 'against Jews', as there are many very good folks of Jewish origin. While the organised Jewish community implements quite a disgusting policy, in domestic and foreign affairs alike, there are wonderful outsiders, 'the remnant of Israel'. Rejected by the community and rejecting it, they stand for integration in Palestine and in the US. Some of them have supported Cynthia's campaign; another outsider manages her campaign. Through them, 'you will be blessed by all people', the Lord's promise to Abraham is made true.

I am not sure whether Rabbi Michael Lerner, the editor of Tikkun, a "Progressive Jewish monthly" from California, will be equally blessed. Rabbi Lerner has spoken in support of Cynthia McKinney, but demanded in return to "call for Israel to be given either membership in NATO or a mutual defence pact with the U.S." Such a support defeats its purpose. As if the military and political US backing of the racist Jewish state were not sufficient, Lerner wants to establish it in law. Cynthia openly spoke against hegemony of the Zionist Lobby, against Israel connection. Lerner offers to achieve the purpose of the Zionist lobby under pretence of fighting it. This sophisticated cunning is not unusual for crypto-Zionists, acting as deep penetration agents outside their milieu, and Lerner already has performed a similar task for the Zionists during Durban Conference[ii]. Next time, he will fight heroin addiction by demanding the drug to be sold in every shop. Cynthia and other congressmen should accept his offer of help for what it is worth, but reject his demand of political payoff to Zionists.

Cynthia's is not a divisive voice of Blacks vs. Whites, nor Democrats vs. Republicans, neither Left against Right. She speaks for the people of the US against foreign interests. She is the congresswoman who dared to remind of the USS Liberty seamen, butchered by Israeli heavy machine guns and missiles. She reminded her audience of the last stand of Faris Ode, the brave Palestinian kid who faced the Israeli tank with a stone and was murdered. She stands against corporate greed. She stands for the nature deemed expendable by the Greedies.

This woman with a name from the love lyrics of Propertius, the delicate Greek poet, who called himself 'a pale knight in thrall of my angry Cynthia', is an all-American figure, brought forth by the spirit of America. The great country does not want to die. In such moments, the land calls for its sons and daughters to step forward to the line of fire. Cynthia heard the call. Support of Cynthia is the ultimate test of love to America, of belief in America's future in the family of nations, as an equal and friendly nation, not as an enforcer for creed of Greed.

It is paramount to rally around her, as the French nobles rallied to Jeanne d'Arc. Whether you are a descendant of African slaves or Muslim immigrants, a son of Confederacy or a Daughter of American Revolution, a freedom-loving Jew or a born-again Christian - it is the time to unite for Cynthia and for America.

Israel Shamir is an Israeli journalist based in Jaffa. His essays can be found on the site www.israelshamir.net  You may freely display this essay on the Web or forward it, but ask for permission in order to publish as hard copy.



[i] a speech at the ADC Chapter in San Francisco on May 22, 2001

[ii] See the Human Shield on my site, www.israelshamir.net

 



--
NOW AN AMAZON KINDLE BOOK ON YOUR PC, iPHONE OR KINDLE DEVICE

Debating the Holocaust: A New Look at Both Sides By Thomas Dalton

In this remarkable, balanced book, the author skillfully reviews and compares "traditional" and "revisionist" views on the "The Holocaust."

On one side is the traditional, orthodox view -- six million Jewish casualties, gas chambers, cremation ovens, mass graves, and thousands of witnesses. On the other is the view of a small band of skeptical writers and researchers, often unfairly labeled "deniers," who contend that the public has been gravely misled about this emotion-laden chapter of history.

The author establishes that the arguments and findings of revisionist scholars are substantive, and deserve serious consideration. He points out, for example, that even the eminent Jewish Holocaust scholar Raul Hilberg acknowledged that there was no budget, plan or order by Hitler for a World War II program to exterminate Europe's Jews.

This book is especially relevant right now, as "Holocaust deniers" are routinely and harshly punished for their "blasphemy," and as growing numbers of people regard the standard, Hollywoodized "Holocaust" narrative with mounting suspicion and distrust.

The author of this book, who writes under the pen name of "Thomas Dalton," is an American scholar who holds a doctoral degree from a major US university.

This is no peripheral debate between arcane views of some obscure aspect of twentieth century history. Instead, this is a clash with profound social-political implications regarding freedom of speech and press, the manipulation of public opinion, how our cultural life is shaped, and how power is wielded in our society.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_0_8?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=debating+the+holocaust&sprefix=DEBATING

Peace.

Michael Santomauro
Editorial Director
Call anytime: 917-974-6367
ReporterNotebook@Gmail.com

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An interesting switcheroo: WWII Reparations for Iran?

 


No wonder they don't like this guy, lol.

Peace,

Ken 

Ahmadinejad to seek UN compensation for WWII / 12-19-09 / PressTV


Iran's president says he will soon write to the UN Secretary-General asking for his country to be compensated for World War II damages.

"We will seek compensation for World War II damages. I have assigned a team to calculate the costs," Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said at a Friday press conference in the Danish capital.

"I will write a letter to the UN Secretary-General [Ban Ki-moon] asking for Iran to be compensated for the damages," he added, pointing out that such a move is necessary to ensure that justice was served.

Ahmadinejad told the reporters that the countries that won the Second World War had inflicted a lot of damage on Iran by invading the country and using its resources.

The president added that while the former Soviet Union, the United States and Britain received compensation after the conflict, Iran had been given nothing to make up for the suffering its people had endured.

"During this period, the Iranian people were subjected to a great deal of pressure and the country suffered a great deal of damages but Iran was not paid any compensation," Ahmadinejad explained.

At the start of World War II, Iran declared its neutrality, but the country was soon invaded by both Britain and the Soviet Union on August 26, 1941 in Operation Countenance.

Iran's refusal to give into Allied demands and expel all German nationals from the country was the excuse they needed to occupy the country. Within months of the invasion Iran became known as "The Bridge of Victory" to the Allies.

When invading the Soviet Union in 1941, the Allies urgently needed to transport war materiel across Iran to the Soviet Union.

The effects of the war, however, were very catastrophic for Iran. Food and other essential items were scarce and severe inflation imposed great hardship on the lower and middle classes as the needs of foreign troops were prioritized.

"Not only was Iran deprived of any compensation for World War II, but 10 years later, the Americans even went as far as arranging a coup to reverse a popular uprising that had led to the nationalization of oil," said Ahmadinejad.

In 1953, Washington orchestrated a coup against the popular and democratically-elected Iranian prime minister of the time, Mohammad Mosaddeq, whose efforts led to the nationalization of the country's oil industry.

Almost half a century later, former US secretary of state Madeleine Albright acknowledged the pivotal role that the US played in the coup, coming closer than any other American diplomat to apologizing for the intervention.

"The Eisenhower administration believed its actions were justified for strategic reasons... But the coup was clearly a setback for Iran's political development. And it is easy to see now why many Iranians continue to resent this intervention by America," she said in March 2000.

Ahmadinejad who had travelled to Copenhagen to take part in the Climate Change Summit, returned to Iran on Saturday morning.

__._,_.


--
NOW AN AMAZON KINDLE BOOK ON YOUR PC, iPHONE OR KINDLE DEVICE

Debating the Holocaust: A New Look at Both Sides By Thomas Dalton

In this remarkable, balanced book, the author skillfully reviews and compares "traditional" and "revisionist" views on the "The Holocaust."

On one side is the traditional, orthodox view -- six million Jewish casualties, gas chambers, cremation ovens, mass graves, and thousands of witnesses. On the other is the view of a small band of skeptical writers and researchers, often unfairly labeled "deniers," who contend that the public has been gravely misled about this emotion-laden chapter of history.

The author establishes that the arguments and findings of revisionist scholars are substantive, and deserve serious consideration. He points out, for example, that even the eminent Jewish Holocaust scholar Raul Hilberg acknowledged that there was no budget, plan or order by Hitler for a World War II program to exterminate Europe's Jews.

This book is especially relevant right now, as "Holocaust deniers" are routinely and harshly punished for their "blasphemy," and as growing numbers of people regard the standard, Hollywoodized "Holocaust" narrative with mounting suspicion and distrust.

The author of this book, who writes under the pen name of "Thomas Dalton," is an American scholar who holds a doctoral degree from a major US university.

This is no peripheral debate between arcane views of some obscure aspect of twentieth century history. Instead, this is a clash with profound social-political implications regarding freedom of speech and press, the manipulation of public opinion, how our cultural life is shaped, and how power is wielded in our society.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_0_8?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=debating+the+holocaust&sprefix=DEBATING

Peace.

Michael Santomauro
Editorial Director
Call anytime: 917-974-6367
ReporterNotebook@Gmail.com

__._,_.___
.

__,_._,___

To Mr. Kamm: Heritage TV...Atlanta... RE: Santamauro

 


From: <jimwdean@aol.com>
Date: Sun, Dec 27, 2009 at 6:59 PM
Subject: Heritage TV...Atlanta... RE: Santamauro
To: oliver.kamm@thetimes.co.uk


Dear Mr. Kamm,
 
I don't know what you have been reading about Mr. Santamauro but I assume it says he is in the holocaust denier realm...and new "N" word invention by the Jewish Lobby constructed to virtually lynch people...or the Neo-Yellow Star of David. It is sad indeed to see jewish folks adapt Nazi tactics.
 
I have known him for years and can tell you categorically that it is not true. I don't know if you are jewish or not but I have found that most jews don't care whether such claims are true or not. The opportunity to do some goyim bashing in public, to keep the others in line with proper thinking, is something that just can't be passed up.
 
As for Irving ( I have seen him in Atlanta a few times and videoed some of his talks) ... all he is guilty of is being targeted by the Jewish Lobby and going the independent publishing route. In the Lipdstadt trial transcripts/depositions, which he amazingly put out on a daily basis, there are two gems that I remembered.
 
First, when Lipstadt sent her first draft in to her 'handlers' they sent it back asking for a rewrite to include more nasty stuff on Irving with the explanation that he was 'their' biggest threat due to his stellar international reputation as a WWII historian. Lipstadt had been paid $25,000 to wright the book. This 'extra material' was not dug up by her, but supplied to her via her handlers...the silly stuff about the big portrait of Hitler in Irving's office (not true)....and his father having fought with Franco (not true)...material supplied by the British Board of Deputies and via Israeli Intel sources interested in keeping the lid in certain things like the British Board of Deputies supporting the Zionist terrorists while they were killing Tommies, and the Zionists working with the Nazis in WWWII.
 
Second, when Irving was on one of his American tours he was scheduled to be on a Washington, DC TV show which the ADL tried to have canceled...their usual good neighbor deal. To their credit the producers said no thanks to the ADL Klansmen...but did get the studio to have an ADL person on the show with Irving (something I have never seen American media do for Zionist critics). This ADL guy in his report to the home office on the show wrote...'Irving is definitely not an anti-semite but we will have to call him one anyway'. This is another example of their good neighbor/welcome to America policy
 
These are just two gems. The trial is filled with archival proof on Jewish Lobby machinations against Irving...but censored out of the US media of course as it is well infiltrated with Israeli assets who keep an eye on things just as you would expect an occupation army media to do.
 
Despite Irving's sham conviction, the trial transcript is an absolutely devastating record of Jewish Lobby black ops against those not considered 'right thinkers'.
 
But Irving is just the tip of the iceberg. The Neturie Karta Jews in New York (I have extensively interviewed Rabbi Weiss) have archival material on the Zionists which is just devastating. Our own declassified Intel on Israel is also just devastating. I show it to vets and retired intel people and they are just astounded at the deception of the American public.
 
I was just doing a year end piece that involved Count Folk Bernadotte's assassination in September 17, 1948 by the Zios.
 
At the time it was pawned off on extremists, the Lehi/Stern Gang, which was disbanded/absorbed afterward into the Israeli army. The actual trigger man, Yehoshua Cohen, put six rounds into the Count and 17 rounds into the unfortunate French Col. Serot, who had switched places with Swedish General Lunsdrom who had been targeted as an anti-semite (the cure for Zionist terrorist at the time being a death sentence). Col. Serot had wanted to thank Berndotte for helping rescue his wife from the Dachau concentration camp.
 
Cohen soon afterward became David Ben-Gurion's personal bodyguard. Before Cohen died (1986), he made the following statement: "With the Bernadotte action, Ben Gurion was able to kill two flies with one swat, he got rid of Bernadotte and us (the Stern Gang)."
 
Stern Gang leader Natan Yalin-Mor, became the first Knesset member for the Stern gang (those amnesties are wonderful things). Yitzhak Shamir, who also led assasination squad, went on to be Prime Minister after Begin.
Yehoshua Zettler, leader of the Count Benadotte assassination team...died May 20th, 2009 at age 91
 
 None of the shooters ever spent a day in jail. Only two Stern gang members did about two weeks of jail before they were pardoned, but only for being members of a terrorist organization, not for killing Bernadotte. None of these people ever regretted what they had done. Actually it enhanced their careers as being a former Zionist terrorist was always a resume enhancer. The Irgun has a memorial website that is still up. But former capos and Warsaw block commanders, who worked with the Nazis, later because political wheels in Israel.

Ruthlessness was also considered a resume enhancer.
 
German cover letter from January 11, 1941 attached to a description of an offer for an alliance with Nazi Germany attributed to Lehi.
 
But David Irving and Michael Sanamauro...now we are to believer are some real bad characters...really dangerous...because of what they think. Bernadotte was killed because he was going to recommend sanctions against the Israelis and opposed their colonial military conquest as destabilizing to the region.
 
But the Zionists today, and their helpers here, have always worked together to destroy people that oppose their policies. Only their methods have changed. And they have more than a few helpers in media and journalism willing to help them. It actually helps them work their way up the career ladder.
 
So don't kid yourself for a minute about who is low man on the pole among Santamauro, Irving and you.

But don't feel bad...you have lots of company.
 
Jim Dean
Heritage TV, Atanta
Assoc. of Former Intelligence Officers
 
 



--
NOW AN AMAZON KINDLE BOOK ON YOUR PC, iPHONE OR KINDLE DEVICE

Debating the Holocaust: A New Look at Both Sides By Thomas Dalton

In this remarkable, balanced book, the author skillfully reviews and compares "traditional" and "revisionist" views on the "The Holocaust."

On one side is the traditional, orthodox view -- six million Jewish casualties, gas chambers, cremation ovens, mass graves, and thousands of witnesses. On the other is the view of a small band of skeptical writers and researchers, often unfairly labeled "deniers," who contend that the public has been gravely misled about this emotion-laden chapter of history.

The author establishes that the arguments and findings of revisionist scholars are substantive, and deserve serious consideration. He points out, for example, that even the eminent Jewish Holocaust scholar Raul Hilberg acknowledged that there was no budget, plan or order by Hitler for a World War II program to exterminate Europe's Jews.

This book is especially relevant right now, as "Holocaust deniers" are routinely and harshly punished for their "blasphemy," and as growing numbers of people regard the standard, Hollywoodized "Holocaust" narrative with mounting suspicion and distrust.

The author of this book, who writes under the pen name of "Thomas Dalton," is an American scholar who holds a doctoral degree from a major US university.

This is no peripheral debate between arcane views of some obscure aspect of twentieth century history. Instead, this is a clash with profound social-political implications regarding freedom of speech and press, the manipulation of public opinion, how our cultural life is shaped, and how power is wielded in our society.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_0_8?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=debating+the+holocaust&sprefix=DEBATING

Peace.

Michael Santomauro
Editorial Director
Call anytime: 917-974-6367
ReporterNotebook@Gmail.com

__._,_.___
.

__,_._,___

Obama aide calls Israel her 'homeland' and a 'healthy democracy'

 

http://mondoweiss.net/2009/12/obama-aide-calls-israel-her-homeland-and-a-healthy-democracy.html

 

Obama aide calls Israel her 'homeland' and a 'healthy democracy'

by PHILIP WEISS on DECEMBER 25, 2009 · 119 COMMENTS

The neocon cabal is going crazy over comments supportive of J Street from Hannah Rosenthal, Obama's aide in charge of fighting anti-Semitism. It's really amazing that the neocons have been able to hurt J Street, a mainstream group if ever there was one, a group that turned its back on the powerful Goldstone report that describes the moral corruption of Israeli society.

Andrew Sullivan, who has been accused of anti-Semitism for his own criticisms of Israeli policy, correctly identifies the Israel lobby's presence in the discourse:

Remember what the neocons believe is a criterion for public office: no criticisms of any Israeli policies. Or you are a suspect Jew or a closet anti-Semite. And they believe this. Thank God the younger generations are less paranoid and less blinkered.

The problem with Sullivan's formulation is that it isn't just neocons. Remember what Haaretz stated baldly in an article a couple weeks back:

Every appointee to the American government must endure a thorough background check by the American Jewish community.

In the case of Obama's government in particular, every criticism against Israel made by a potential government appointee has become a catalyst for debate about whether appointing "another leftist" offers proof that Obama does not truly support Israel."

I.e., it's Democrats who are imposing this criterion, not just neocons!

I would take this analysis further. Rosenthal made several comments in her interview with Haaretz suggesting that this high White House official, whose office is on the same floor as Hillary Clinton's at the State Department, regards Israel as her country.

"It is not 1939," she said. "We have the state of Israel…"

Although she did not say outright what she thought Israel should do regarding the peace process, when pressed, she said: "I lived in Israel in 1973 in the bomb shelters. I don't want my kids or my grandchildren to have to ever come visit their homeland and to live in a bomb shelter – that is what I mean when I say the matzav [the situation/conflict] … Sometimes I wonder what it does to the psyche of people and children to know that they have to know where the nearest bomb shelter is – that's not okay. As a peace loving person and as a Jew who wants my kids to feel comfortable here [Israel]- I think that's what I mean that the matzav cannot continue."



From the time that Herzl began promoting Jewish nationalism in the 1890s, anti-Zionist Jews said, Wait, you're threatening our patriotism to our country! This was a refrain in England and the U.S., where Jews did not require liberation. Today, dual loyalty continues to be an issue. I started this blog in large part because I saw the neocons, many of whom feel tremendous loyalty to Israel, helping to plot a war by the United States.  

The essence of dual loyalty is a failure to distinguish American interest from an Israeli one. Rosenthal describes Israel as a "healthy democracy." Well: It is a democracy for Jews, as many Palestinians point out. That it is not a democracy for Palestinians is known throughout the Arab/Muslim world, and that fact is damaging the American image in this dangerous region. I believe that Hannah Rosenthal is incapable of acknowledging that fact, out of a religious identification. Let's hope Sullivan is right about the coming generations…

 


--
NOW AN AMAZON KINDLE BOOK ON YOUR PC, iPHONE OR KINDLE DEVICE

Debating the Holocaust: A New Look at Both Sides By Thomas Dalton

In this remarkable, balanced book, the author skillfully reviews and compares "traditional" and "revisionist" views on the "The Holocaust."

On one side is the traditional, orthodox view -- six million Jewish casualties, gas chambers, cremation ovens, mass graves, and thousands of witnesses. On the other is the view of a small band of skeptical writers and researchers, often unfairly labeled "deniers," who contend that the public has been gravely misled about this emotion-laden chapter of history.

The author establishes that the arguments and findings of revisionist scholars are substantive, and deserve serious consideration. He points out, for example, that even the eminent Jewish Holocaust scholar Raul Hilberg acknowledged that there was no budget, plan or order by Hitler for a World War II program to exterminate Europe's Jews.

This book is especially relevant right now, as "Holocaust deniers" are routinely and harshly punished for their "blasphemy," and as growing numbers of people regard the standard, Hollywoodized "Holocaust" narrative with mounting suspicion and distrust.

The author of this book, who writes under the pen name of "Thomas Dalton," is an American scholar who holds a doctoral degree from a major US university.

This is no peripheral debate between arcane views of some obscure aspect of twentieth century history. Instead, this is a clash with profound social-political implications regarding freedom of speech and press, the manipulation of public opinion, how our cultural life is shaped, and how power is wielded in our society.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_0_8?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=debating+the+holocaust&sprefix=DEBATING

Peace.

Michael Santomauro
Editorial Director
Call anytime: 917-974-6367
ReporterNotebook@Gmail.com

__._,_.___
.

__,_._,___

Princeton Economist and Computer Scientists Show that Derivatives Are Inherently Vulnerable to Fraud

 

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 24, 2009

Guest Post: Princeton Economist and Computer Scientists Show that Derivatives Are Inherently Vulnerable to Fraud

By Washington's Blog.

As I have previously noted, credit default swaps are destabilizing for the economy. See this. And the models used to evaluate financial instruments – such as the Gaussian copula formula for CDOs – are inherently flawed.

Now, Princeton University economists and computer scientists have demonstrated that financial derivatives are also inherently vulnerable to fraudulent pricing.

PhysOrg summarizes Princeton's findings:

In a result that may have implications for financial regulation, researchers from computer science and economics have revealed potentially impenetrable problems with the pricing of financial derivatives. They show that sellers of these investments could purposefully include pieces of bad risk that no buyer could detect even with the most powerful computers.

The research focused on collateralized debt obligations, or CDOs, an investment tool that combines many mortgages with the promise of spreading out and lowering the risk of default. The team examined what would happen if a seller knew that some mortgages were "lemons" and structured a package of CDOs to benefit himself. They found that the manipulation may be impossible for buyers to detect either at time of sale or later when the derivative loses money.

The team consists of Sanjeev Arora, director of Princeton's Center for Computational Intractability, his colleague Boaz Barak, economics professor Markus Brunnermeier, and computer science graduate student Rong Ge.

It is now standard wisdom that a major culprit in the 2008 financial meltdown was use of simplistic mathematical models of risk at financial firms. This paper, released as a working draft Oct. 15, suggests that the problems may go deeper.

"We are cautioning that even if you have the right model it's not easy to price derivatives," Arora said. "Making the models more complicated will not make these effects go away, even for computationally sophisticated."

Arora noted that the problem arises from asymmetric information between buyers and sellers, and goes against conventional wisdom in economic theory, which holds that derivatives reduce the negative effects of such unequal information.

"Standard economics emphasizes that securitization can mitigate the cost of asymmetric information," Brunnermeier said. "We stress that certain derivative securities introduce additional complexity and thus a new layer of asymmetric information that can be so severe it overturns the initial advantage."

Brunnermeier noted that the finding came from combining computer science and finance, which has not been done before but has the potential for further insights. "I anticipate that both fields can enrich each other," he said.

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2009/12/guest-post-princeton-economist-and-computer-scientists-show-that-derivatives-are-inherently-vulnerable-to-fraud.html

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Sarah Jessica Parker--AN IMPORTANT CASE STUDY TO READ.

 

Dec. 26, 2005


http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Books/story?id=1429337


'Stars of David : Prominent Jews Talk About Being Jewish' by Abigail Pogrebin


Excerpt:

"If I watch a television show about somebody and there's a Jew on there -- I don't mean fiction, I mean reality -- and there's a guy on there named Goldfarb and he's a jackass, I'm like, 'You're bad for the Jews.'

"Matthew not only identifies as a Jew. His perspective in life has very much to do with Hitler and the persecution of Jews.

I ask for her reaction to Nat Hentoff's comment, made a few months after 9/11, that he can imagine one day hearing over a loudspeaker, "All Jews gather in Times Square." "I live with someone who can imagine that, I think," Parker says. "So I'm inclined to be able to imagine it myself. You often become the person you're married to or you live with; you just do. And I'm pretty influenced by his thinking often anyway. It wasn't so long ago that the Holocaust happened. It really did happen very recently. And so many denied it and couldn't bear the thought of it or weren't interested in the plight. So, yes; it's not beyond imagining. "

I ask her if she notices which of her friends are Jewish. "If Matthew and I are with friends who are Jewish, you just feel something you can't describe–like trying to describe a color; you can't. It's just commonality -- like, 'Oh yeah, we're with our people.'

'Wow, you look so pretty,' I always joke -- if I know them really well -- 'You're an anti-Semite!' Because I just feel it's a little stab at the Jews. 


START:

Sarah Jessica Parker

Sarah Jessica Parker, whose father was Jewish, is eight months pregnant when I meet her, dressed in denim overalls and a black leotard, sitting in a Greenwich Village café near her new brownstone. She says that she and her husband, actor Matthew Broderick -- whose mother was Jewish -- are still not quite sure how they're going to raise their impending baby. "We happen to live next to a temple and I think it's really nice, and I wonder, 'What should we do?' " says Parker. " 'Should this child of ours have more religious education than we had?' Sometimes I think there's something attractive about Unitarianism. It's a little bit more progressive and philosophical. If I could apply that kind of approach -- what I understand it to be -- to being a Jew, that might feel right. I would like our child to have choices and know more than I've ever known about his or her religion. But Matthew doesn't know what he wants for this child and it's important to me that he feels comfortable."

It also gives Parker pause to realize how little she knows about Judaism. "I said to Matthew, 'If we went to this temple next door, where would we begin? We're so behind.' In temple, it seems like you have to know what you're doing. And it intimidates people; it certainly intimidates me. And I keep saying, `I'm not a religious person,' but I know that's not true; I know that I believe that there's somebody who watches over us and he or she takes care or not, or teaches us. I really do -- strangely enough–kind of cling to that. And I think that Matthew is as deeply as religious as I am, but he's cynical about it because he's seen that it can be so harmful and hurtful and destructive."

She says Broderick's ambivalence was evident when they were preparing the baby's room. "A dear friend of mine named Bettianne, who is Jewish, gave me a beautiful mezuzah; she got it at West Side Judaica. It has three little children on it and they're playing, sledding. I said, 'When we move into the new house, we'll put it up.' And I thought I'd told Matthew–I'm almost sure that I told him at one point–but when he heard me saying on the phone to Bettianne, 'When Matthew's home next week, we'll put the mezuzah up,' he said, 'What? We're not practicing Jews–we can't have a mezuzah in our home.' It seemed wrong to him. I said, 'It's not wrong. It's a really nice thought. It's just a gift to say, 'Safekeeping to you.'

"So Bettianne and I put it up ourselves on the door to the baby's bedroom. And I love it. I walk up the steps every day and I see it in our new house on the door to the baby's bedroom and I feel like it's yet one more person keeping an eye on the baby. It doesn't bother me; doesn't seem to bother Matthew." She said it feels like the mezuzah is in the right place. "It's not on the door to our home because that's too big -- too much," she says. "Frankly, if someone had given me a tiny cross that meant something--" She cuts herself off. "There's this man that I see in the neighborhood all the time. He gave me this card for the saint of fertility and the saint of babies and this tiny little medal. And I was very touched by it and I've kept it next to me for my whole pregnancy because I thought, 'For him that means something and it's a nice thought.' It doesn't mean I'm converting to the Catholic Church. This is a nice man; he wishes me well, he wishes my child well. I wouldn't hang it, but it's nice to have."

The baby will have a Christmas tree. "Matthew and I get one every year, but it has no religious content. Growing up, it wasn't religious at all. My Mom and Dad loved the smell in the house -- I mean my stepfather, who raised me. We love the tradition of it -- we've had the same ornaments from the time before my oldest brother was born. It's about family and ritual -- the same things that I respond to in being a Jew."

Parker, born in Cincinnati, says her biological father's parents were "from that part of Eastern Europe that would go back and forth between being Russian and Polish." According to family lore, the name "Parker" was created by a series of miscommunications. "My great-grandfather on my father's side came over to Ellis Island. His name was Bar-Kahn, which means 'son of Kohen,' and the immigration officer thought he said 'Parken.' He wrote his N's like R's, so 'Parken' became 'Parker' and he was so happy to be in America and to have a business that was fairly thriving, that he never corrected his customers and he became Parker. So there's also great pride attached to this idea that we're Kohens," she says with a smile, referring to the fact that Kohens -- or Kohanim -- were the ancient line of high priests. "You know, the great tribe of Israel."

Parker believes her mother has Jewish blood as well, but that lineage is hard to trace. "According to Matthew, Hitler would have been perfectly happy to call me a Jew because there was enough Jewish blood in me that I was not a desirable. And I have, frankly, always just considered myself a Jew. Maybe I feel Jewish because my mother is very skeptical of organized religion in general and being a Jew felt more cultural to me. I was always responding to things that were Jewish.

"I think also because New York was this great jewel to us and it was such a Jewish city that I was so thrilled to identify with anybody from there, to be part of it." Parker's Jewishness, she says, is rooted in large part in nostalgia. "My father was raised on Ocean Avenue in Brooklyn -- he was on the Brighton Beach line. It's a very Jewish community. And every year on our summer visits, the people we spent time with were Jews. Whenever we came to New York on Sundays we always went to Chinatown. To us that was a very Jewish thing.

"A lot of the literature that my mother read, including The New Yorker, had a lot of Jewish writers. I was always very aware of that. I think my mother always said that when she met my father, he reminded her of Philip Roth. They were both Jewish writers from blue-collar families. So from an early age, I had some idea about Jews being cultured intellectuals, Jews being on the correct side politically. I learned later on that Jews can be very right wing and very different from what I understood a Jew to be, and that being Jewish wasn't just about food and culture and art."

Adding to the religious amalgam is Matthew's sister, who is an Episcopal priest, and Parker's older sister, who is an observant Jew. "My sister is Modern Orthodox. She didn't shave her head–you don't have to. She's one of my best friends. And I've learned more from her about the actual practice and ritual of being a Jew than I've ever known before." Parker says her other teacher has been her husband. "Matthew not only identifies as a Jew. I mean, he really is. He knows more about the Bible and the Jewish story. He really sees things through the eyes of a Jew and it's fascinating to me. His perspective in life has very much to do with Hitler and the persecution of Jews. He identifies as a Jew, but it's much more political for him. He's not curious about any other religions. It's not like he's thinking, 'Let's explore Unitarianism, let's explore Buddhism, and let's also explore Judaism as a choice for our child.' He would only think about being a practicing Jew. We're always looking for a seder. This year we drove four and a half hours to go to a Rosh Hashanah dinner. Matthew likes a lot of the rituals -- when he sees them, it's very moving to him. But I don't know that he wants to be an active, religious Jew because I think he finds fault, as we all do, with a lot of religion. For instance, the separation of men and women in services, and some archaic ways of living your life.

"And frankly, for us -- traveling gypsies that we are -- nothing that requires that kind of commitment is appealing. Or sometimes it is and sometimes it isn't. But you can't dabble in it. It's not like being into sushi or something. It's a real thing; you can't belittle it. It's too meaningful to people."

She says the crisis in Israel makes them both feel more Jewish. "It makes you identify. I feel much more strongly about the situation there and I feel foolish about it too because I don't know the history. But I do know that I feel defensive when people say, 'How can Israel go in with tanks?' What are they supposed to do? Children are being killed by people willing to strap bombs to their bodies and walk into the public market. So Israel's response to this is to protect its people. I am not an Ariel Sharon fan, but what are the Israelis supposed to do? Just be decent? When you think of Rabin and all these remarkable people who have died, it makes you really much more of a Jew. " She says she has trouble hearing people question Israel's conduct. "To me it's like trying to have a logical argument with a pro-lifer. I can't have the conversation because there's no logic that applies. If you don't understand why Israel has to defend itself.… The extremists want the Jews gone. So why should the Jews feel safe?"

I ask for her reaction to Nat Hentoff's comment, made a few months after 9/11, that he can imagine one day hearing over a loudspeaker, "All Jews gather in Times Square." "I live with someone who can imagine that, I think," Parker says. "So I'm inclined to be able to imagine it myself. You often become the person you're married to or you live with; you just do. And I'm pretty influenced by his thinking often anyway. It wasn't so long ago that the Holocaust happened. It really did happen very recently. And so many denied it and couldn't bear the thought of it or weren't interested in the plight. So, yes; it's not beyond imagining. "

I ask her if she notices which of her friends are Jewish. "If Matthew and I are with friends who are Jewish, you just feel something you can't describe–like trying to describe a color; you can't. It's just commonality -- like, 'Oh yeah, we're with our people.' But I have a lot of non-Jewish friends. Many of them seem to think of being Jewish as slightly exotic."

I ask Parker if she cared about marrying a Jew. "No, but when I met Matthew, I was like, 'Well this is that guy!' " She exhibits a kind of aha! " 'This is the type of guy my mother always liked: the cultured, well-read Jew from Greenwich Village in New York City!' "

Parker says she and Matthew share similar reference points, despite the fact that they grew up so differently. "There's a lot about the aesthetics of our childhood that were extremely similar. And I honestly feel it's because when my mother was raising us in Cincinnati, she was thinking: 'How do cultured Jews in New York City raise their children?' " Parker says her mother emulated an ideal she had implanted in her mind. "The goal was a combination of how cultured Jews in New York City raise their children and how Rose Kennedy raised her children. She was sort of hoping to get the best of both."

I ask her if she's been asked to talk publicly about her Jewish half. "A couple of times newspapers have called -- the Forward for example -- and I've said, 'I can't do this because I would do a disservice to your faith; I don't know enough about it. I'm a Jew because my father is, and that's what we feel we are. But I think sometimes people would like anybody who has a public face at all to be part of it. I wouldn't call myself a famous Jew, but my experience over the years has been that if someone wants me to talk at length about being Jewish in a Jewish paper or publication, I feel I couldn't be further from an authority and I don't want to say things that are uneducated. There are people who are more of note who know more about being a Jew than I do. So I've never done it."

Though ethnic publications may look to her as a role model, I wonder if, in the early days of her career, she was viewed as an ethnic type? Parker nods. "I was offered a movie and it was rescinded because they decided I was too Jewish." She won't say who rejected her. "I shouldn't because they probably wouldn't want -- " She chuckles. "Because they're Jews! That's what I thought was so ironic. It's like, 'Oh, you're a Jew calling me too Jewish!' I think they said I was just 'too Jewish looking.' I think for a long time, people who had curly hair and features that weren't traditionally accepted as pretty were just considered ethnic and still are. I think there's a place for those types more now, but it's not as if we've come so far that it's the new standard. It's not gone the way of the hula hoop."

One could say that, thanks to Carrie Bradshaw -- her character on Sex and the City -- she's created a new archetype. "I don't know that anything's changed," she disagrees. "I think I've had luck because I've found parts and obviously more recently, specifically a part. But Carrie Bradshaw is clearly not a Jew. So that character didn't disprove the bias that beauty is incompatible with ethnicity. I don't know if there's a ripple effect for me professionally or not. And I don't pay too much attention to it because, frankly, there was a period in my career years ago when it stopped mattering to me that a studio executive didn't think I was pretty. Because I couldn't let it. I hadn't started off with a career in which that mattered and I knew that that wasn't what my career was going to be."

Didn't she have a moment of wishing she was the classic American beauty? "Yes, I did have a moment. I remember pretty vividly -- because I actually articulated it at the time–I said, 'This is really frustrating because I'm always playing the cerebral best friend of the pretty girl.' Now, what I didn't mind about that was those were generally the more interesting parts. But it's frustrating to not be considered attractive by men who make decisions. That's what's hurtful. It's not the quality, necessarily, of the role; it's the personal ego stab that is hurtful. And you just figure out whether you have the constitution to continue. That's why I think my parents were very against me working in television and film. I think they thought that in the theater, beauty has broader parameters. My parents saw that it was when I got involved in movies that my feelings were hurt."

But did she view those slights as related to her being Jewish? "I saw it as an ethnicity issue," Parker replies. "I thought if I had straight hair and a perfect nose, my whole career would be different. And I still feel like, when I walk on the set of a movie or a television show, and my hair is straight and all the guys say to me, 'Wow, you look so pretty,' I always joke -- if I know them really well -- 'You're an anti-Semite!' Because I just feel it's a little stab at the Jews. I always feel that people think that straight hair is pretty and curly hair is unruly and Jewish. I think it's anti-ethnic."

I'm talking to Parker before she starts taping the last season of Sex and the City, and I'm curious about the show's explicitly Jewish character, Harry Goldenblatt -- Charlotte's paramour. (At the time we spoke, Harry had told Charlotte he couldn't marry someone who wasn't Jewish and she was considering conversion.) "We live in a city that's full of Jews," says Parker, who is also the show's executive producer. "The fact that we haven't dealt with it more and also didn't do better fleshed-out Jewish characters bothered me," Parker says. "And I still worry that Harry Goldenblatt is too clichéd. That's the problem with being a man on our show. It takes time for dimension to come. We have this great actor, Evan Handler, and he's really sexy and he's smart and I'm excited about the potential of that. But I think we have to be careful that he doesn't become the false cliché of the loud, boorish Jewish lawyer who's aggressive; that he is dignified and interesting and smart and sexy and witty and flawed and all the things that make any guy interesting. I'm excited about it, but I hope we do it well." In other words, if they do it poorly, it could be bad for the Jews. "If I watch a television show about somebody and there's a Jew on there -- I don't mean fiction, I mean reality -- and there's a guy on there named Goldfarb and he's a jackass, I'm like, 'You're bad for the Jews.' It's one more excuse for bigots to say, 'Look at the Jews.' And I'm very protective that way. I'm very ashamed of stereotyping and one person doing a great disservice to millions."

A couple pass our table wheeling their newborn in a carriage, and Parker comments on how cute the baby is. She chats easily with these strangers -- they clearly recognize her despite her pulled back hair and lack of makeup -- and it's an unremarkable conversation, like any other between new parents and a mother-to-be from around the neighborhood. It occurs to me that Parker is not just on the cusp of childbirth but of all the childrearing issues that follow; she realizes it will be up to her to shape this new Broderick's identity, when she's still not quite sure of her own. "If there was a temple I could go to," Parker says, "to get guidance -- counsel of some kind, or just a place to sit and contemplate, whatever that means for me.… If there was a place where you could come in and they say, 'This is what we're going to talk about today and let me put it in context for you and see whether it applies to you or not,' and hear great music and be with people who are like-minded, I think you'd have a much more growing population of people who practice the Jewish faith."


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