Posts by Jake Pollock
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Craig, as anyone who knows me will testify, I'm about as pedantic as they come. However, I think the arguments being made by supporters of Key are dissembling and disingenuous, and that Key's 'technical correctness' and your (and others) 'so did Helen send troops to a war zone or not' lines of argument so completely miss the point that they're comical.
I note, for instance, that you didn't respond to the substance of my criticism of your claims, or to those that followed mine, and instead played the martyr. I think it has been well demonstrated that your 'simple matters of clearly recorded fact' are not so simple, and rest on a definition of the 'Iraq War' that is ahistorical and decontextualised, and fails to account for the not so subtle difference between the initial invasion and the ongoing conflict.
I agree, it matters. It matters so much that we should think through these issues with subtlety, and respond to arguments, not to concluding sentences.
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What part of that don't you understand?
The part where the usually reasonable Craig Ranapia appears to clutch at straws. ;-)
In May 2003 the conflict seemed to have ended. In 2007, that appears not to have been the case. Phil Goff's comments, when placed in their proper historical context, appear sensible. We know now that the initial war against the Iraqi state was over then, but that the long and intractable guerrilla war hadn't got started.
Clarke's comments also make sense in this context -- they sent troops after the pre-emptive invasion, after the UN Declaration, and withdrew them when it became obvious that the war was still going on, despite Uncle Sam's assurances to the contrary.
It's all beside the point, really. The real point is not whether John Key was "technically correct", which would lead us into all sorts of digressions about whether a war has to be between states to be a war (no), or whether the war at the moment is the same war as the one that took place in 2003 (probably not). The point is why would a party that wants to be a government neglect to mention its policy on the major conflict of our times, a conflict which it has been asked about time and time again, with ever more evasive responses? We know what Labour's policy is -- they sent some engineers, didn't like it, now they're against it to the point of getting into histrionics over Air New Zealand sending a few Australians to Kuwait. We still don't know what National think, and apparently their leader thinks there isn't a conflict worth discussing. How odd.
Maybe National (and their supporters) should stop getting pedantic about who is 'technically correct', and start fronting up with their actual opinions on the matter.
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Dunno if it's perhaps a coincidence...I had to reboot for that latest firmware update for the Core2 Duo Macs....and that seem to push the clock forward.
Yep, a reboot fixed it.
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That patch updated the time on the actual clock in the system preferences on my MacBook, but the clock in the display in the top right hand corner is still on the old time.
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"Tired of warming the bench? Put some fire in your belly".
Or something, I dunno.
And Jeremy, if you want to take the edge off, put some water in it. It will cool it down a bit but not suppress the flavour like ice will. Also, it makes it go all cloudy, which I think is kind of neat.
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Personally, I'm more troubled that we're squinting past murderous state homophobia (because, after all, there's no homosexuality when all the fags and dykes are dead) as long as the regimes involved keep buying plenty of good Kiwi butter and lamb.
As a matter of fact, I went to a talk by Afsaneh Najmadi earlier this year about sex change operations in Iran (they're called sex changes rather than gender reassignments in Iran, as the distinction between gender and sex isn't the same as it is in the West). Apparently, there are many many more sex changes in Iran than anywhere else in the world, as it's a way for people who experience same sex desire to evade oppressive laws. The point, though, is that these sex changes are all state funded, as a tacit acknowledgment that homosexual desire exists, even if homosexual identity doesn't (cue witty comment about state-sponsored terrorism here). So when Ahmadinejad said 'we don't have homosexuals in the same way as you do here', he kind of had a point.
And before anyone has a go at me, I know that these laws are terrible and executions do take place on a regular basis. In fact, Najmabadi explicitly declines to name female supporters in Iran because the threat against lesbians is much, much worse than against gay men. Nevertheless, the situation is actually a lot more complicated than it is generally made out to be. I highly recommend Najmabdi's Women With Moustaches, Men Without Beards for a fascinating look at the history of sexuality and gender in Persia and Iran. It's certainly much more sophisticated and worth reading than Rory English's utterances.
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Heh. Chris Trotter thinks the fourth Labour government was the parliamentary equivalent of Sir Lancelot, bringing down the glorious Camelot from within.
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Well, while we are plugging histories of NZ, here is my new favourite, and from one of our greatest Prime Ministers no less!
Wow. Just wow.
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Thanks for that Racism: A History tip. An excellent peak into recent scholarship on the Atlantic slave trade, I thought. The 2nd of three is currently showing up on the torrents as well.
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<quote>With a taste in music history - tell me Einsteins - where do I go to buy a copy of Thomas Edison reciting "Mary had a little Lamb", pre 1914 - hell - pre 1900 recordings of all sorts, obscure comedy tracks we used to have on 78's, long broken/<quote>
Archive.org has a lot of that sort of stuff.