The only real guessing game about U.S. foreign policy in the next year or so regards Israel and the Palestinians. My bet is that the president is serious about the roadmap, supports Colin Powell and is going to make some neoconservatives somewhat uneasy in the coming months. Why do I think that? Because the president has said so. I take his words seriously. So does Tony Blair. I thought this comment of his yesterday was revealing: “President Bush himself is completely committed to taking the Middle East peace process forward. I would take the words of President Bush, they are good enough for me, and I think they are good enough for you.” My guess is that this explicitly was the price for British support in Iraq. Yes, it’s important that new Palestinian leadership actually emerge that can make a land-carve-up credible at all. If that leadership does emerge, it will also be because of president Bush’s under-rated insistence and patience. But if that really does happen, I have no doubt that Bush will move. Iraq has made the matter far more pliable. And vice-versa.
THE FIRST POLL? I don’t know exactly what to make of this, but the first poll of Iraqis by an Indian outfit, NDTV, has found that a clear majority support the U.S. invasion. More worryingly, the younger they were, the less pro-American. But there is considerable support for a lengthy U.S. presence, making this a kind of requested temporary neo-colonization. Is that a first?
STICKING IT TO TITLE IX: Here’s a fascinating example of genuine gender non-discrimination: a boy allowed to play on a girls’ high school lacrosse team, because there were no real spots for the guy on local boys’ teams. Actually, there were no local boys’ teams. They key, I guess, is that he weighs 140 pounds. But he’s still the biggest scorer, so to speak. And the experience brought out some choice quotes: “We were checking the heck out of his stick,” opined his female coach. I bet you were, girls. I bet you were.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: “What rankles Frenchmen is the decline of France relative to other European countries. France wants to be not a world power but the foremost European nation. If the present fuel debacle brings about a decline of Western Europe, France wants to make sure that it ends up sitting on top of the heap. To solve the fuel problem by force would result in a situation in which France could not play a paramount role. Hence France will urge submission to Arab dictates. It will also be for the abandonment of Israel and the cold-shouldering of the United States.” – Eric Hoffer, “Before the Sabbath,” written in 1975. Give the guy the reverse of the von Hoffman award.
GRRRR: I’ve always been a fan of dragons, so this article today riveted me. It never occurred to me to ask why human beings had fantasized and feared such mythical creatures for so long. I assumed that the world was a scary place and that imagination had simply run wild. Nuh-huh:
In “An Instinct for Dragons” (Routledge, 2000), Dr. David E. Jones, a professor of anthropology at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, posits a biological explanation that jibes with the Jungian notion of unconscious collective fears. He argues that the dragon image, fermented in the primal soup of man’s first nightmares, is a composite of the carnivores who fed on human ancestors when they were tree-dwelling monkeys: the pythons, the big cats and the raptors.
I feel robbed. Then there’s this banality:
Bones exposed by storms, earthquakes or digging were well known to the ancients, said Dr. Adrienne Mayor, a professor of folklore at Princeton and the author of “The First Fossil Hunters” (Princeton, 2000). She argues that the myth of gold-guarding griffins arose in the red clay of the Gobi Desert, a landscape literally scattered with white Protoceratops skulls, with parrot beaks and bony neck frills.
I guess it makes sense now. But don’t we as humans simply need to create terror at the end of the world, even if only to make our everyday fears seem more manageable? Humans live in relative space and time. The avoidance of dragons makes mere survival seem like security. And without them, whom would our heroes have to slay?
REALITY CHECK: “One of your letter writers asked, ‘Do any of the other three states with sodomy laws impose jail time?’ In 1999, the state of Oklahoma raised the prison term for consensual sex by gay couples from 10 years to 20 years. A felony, consensual sex between two adult men or between two adult women in Oklahoma carries the same penalty as same-sex rape.” Just more “inclusiveness” out there. More feedback on the Letters Page.
The Dish 